# Apollo 13 (the movie) **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 28, 2004, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972 "2004-08-28T17:42:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![don\_t\_ask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2004, 1:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972/21 "2004-08-29T13:16:44Z")
[This guy](http://myweb.accessus.net/~090/apollo13.html) is a real buff. He has transcripts and an annotated script that shows where the script differs from reality. The thing that I like about the movie is that you can watch it without ever caring that you don’t understand what a lot of the dialogue means. I find I just absorb it as though by osmosis. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Blue\_Sky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d26b3c/32.png) [@Mr.Blue\_Sky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Blue_Sky)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2004, 2:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972/22 "2004-08-29T14:18:01Z")
> [@DooWahDiddy](#): > > I have it on VHS, which is what I watched, and I noticed it too. So it was definitely not a hallucination. As to whether or not they edited that out, someone with the DVD will have to answer that. I just checked the DVD and, although it’s very brief, you can see that it is the _Let It Be_ album. Here’s a [screen capture](http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2004-1/584173/Letitbe.jpg). ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2004, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972/23 "2004-08-29T20:21:29Z")
“Let it Be” was released AFTER the Beatles broke up - about a month later, IIRC. They did in fact break up when Apollo 13 was in space, so they got that part right. It’s an understandable error. ---
**Author:** ![Icerigger](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/icerigger/32/432_2.png) [@Icerigger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Icerigger)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2004, 11:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972/24 "2004-08-29T23:27:36Z")
As others have said the book about the mission is much more detailed than the movie, which barely scratches the surface. A humorous anecdote in the book **Lost Moon** (AKA) Apollo 13 by Jim Lovell & Jeff Kluger. Grumman the manufacturer of the LEM sent a “bill” to North American Rockwell maker of the CSM. Description of services provided. **Total Charge $401,000. Towing, $4.00 first mile, $1.00 for each additional mile $400,001. Battery charge, road call. Customer’s jumper cables. Total $4.05. Oxygen @ $10.00 pound total $500.00. Sleeping accommodations for two, no TV, air conditioned, with radio. Prepaid. Additional guest $8.00 night. 20% government discount leaves $312,421.24.** Lunar Module checkout no later than noon Friday. Accommodations not guaranteed beyond that time. ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2004, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972/25 "2004-08-30T00:43:13Z")
> [@Icerigger](#): > > As others have said the book about the mission is much more detailed than the movie, which barely scratches the surface. A humorous anecdote in the book **Lost Moon** (AKA) Apollo 13 by Jim Lovell & Jeff Kluger. > > Grumman the manufacturer of the LEM sent a “bill” to North American Rockwell maker of the CSM. > > Description of services provided. > > **Total Charge $401,000. Towing, $4.00 first mile, $1.00 for each additional mile $400,001. Battery charge, road call. Customer’s jumper cables. Total $4.05. Oxygen @ $10.00 pound total $500.00. Sleeping accommodations for two, no TV, air conditioned, with radio. Prepaid. Additional guest $8.00 night. 20% government discount leaves $312,421.24.** > > Lunar Module checkout no later than noon Friday. Accommodations not guaranteed beyond that time. In response, Rockwell sent a pointed note to Grumman which mentioned that Rockwell hadn’t charged Grumman a tow fee for the previous Apollo missions, and that if they were to do so, the total bill would exceed that of the current “bill.” Things might have continued back and forth like this for a while, but the higher ups at both companies got wind of it, and were not amused, and put a stop to things. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2004, 7:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972/26 "2004-08-30T07:30:44Z")
> [@Johnny L.A.](#): > > Anyone who is into Apollo would do well to see [_Moon Shot_](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0124010/). From amazon: > > And definitely read _ **Lost Moon** _ by Jim Lovell. A very good read, chockful of information. I’ve read and seen _Moon Shot_, and it is probably my least favorite of the Apollo books. It plays them up as the stars (Amazon wasn’t kidding) and the saviors of the space program way too much. But, back to the topic, _Apollo 13_ is awesome. To achieve suspense on re-entry, when we know how it is going to come out, is fine filmmaking. ---
**Author:** ![ryanbobo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b4bc9f/32.png) [@ryanbobo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ryanbobo)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2004, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972/27 "2004-08-30T13:36:40Z")
> [@](#): > > Originaly Posted by **Sam Stone** > I mean, they actually shot many of the zero-G sequences in zero G. I’ve always wondered how they faked the zero G. And now I find out that it wasn’t faked. So, second question, how did they create zero G for filming? Thanks to anyone who knows. ---
**Author:** ![Jadis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/87869e/32.png) [@Jadis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jadis)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2004, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972/28 "2004-08-30T13:43:01Z")
> [@ryanbobo](#): > > I’ve always wondered how they faked the zero G. And now I find out that it wasn’t faked. So, second question, how did they create zero G for filming? > > Thanks to anyone who knows. I believe it was done on a series (as in hundreds of runs) of flights where the plane did a steep climb and then a sudden dive…at the apex of the climb/dive switchover, there are a few seconds of weightlessness. ---
**Author:** ![Moon-Watcher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/49beb7/32.png) [@Moon-Watcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moon-Watcher)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2004, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972/29 "2004-08-30T13:43:39Z")
> [@ryanbobo](#): > > I’ve always wondered how they faked the zero G. And now I find out that it wasn’t faked. So, second question, how did they create zero G for filming? > > Thanks to anyone who knows. They utilized NASA’s “Vomit Comet,” a plane that flies in parabolic arcs to achieve zero-g for a few seconds at a time. [http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/ask\_astro/answers/970325a.html](http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/ask_astro/answers/970325a.html) ---
**Author:** ![Rufus\_Xavier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/eada6e/32.png) [@Rufus\_Xavier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rufus_Xavier)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2004, 1:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972/30 "2004-08-30T13:48:43Z")
> [@ryanbobo](#): > > I’ve always wondered how they faked the zero G. And now I find out that it wasn’t faked. So, second question, how did they create zero G for filming? > > Thanks to anyone who knows. I believe they filmed the real zero G scenes on the [“vomit comet”.](http://jsc-aircraft-ops.jsc.nasa.gov/kc135/) ---
**Author:** ![Zebra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c0e974/32.png) [@Zebra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zebra)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2004, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972/31 "2004-08-30T13:59:09Z")
> [@DooWahDiddy](#): > > Just an appreciation thread. I just watched it (not for the first time) and I just think it’s a great movie. Yes, it’s sometimes over-the-top in a Spielberg kind of way; yes, the line between fact and fiction is sometimes thin, but come on… Jim Lovell’s wife gets to me every time, and James Horner’s music is pleasantly not performed by Celine Dion. > > Fantastic effects + triumph over adversity = great movie. You do know that it was directed by Ron Howard. I watched the DVD once in French. It was pretty strange. I really got a laugh out of the scene where Ed Harris is yelling that he wants the re-entry proceedures and he wants them RIGHT NOW! In French he yells at the guy and finishes it off with TOOT SWEET! (probably not spelled right) ---
**Author:** ![PunditLisa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/4af34b/32.png) [@PunditLisa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PunditLisa)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2004, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972/32 "2004-08-30T14:31:08Z")
One of my Top 10 favorite movies. It is also scheduled to be re-released in [IMAX Format](http://www.imax.com/apollo13/). Pass the popcorn! ---
**Author:** ![Mollie\_Magill](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mollie_magill/32/20882_2.png) [@Mollie\_Magill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mollie_Magill)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2004, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972/33 "2004-08-30T15:24:10Z")
> [@Mach Tuck](#): > > I love the movie, but I think it was very unfair to Jack Swigert. There was this implication throughout the film that maybe he wasn’t quite up to the task, and everyone was worried about his part in the flight. In fact, this was completely untrue. The backups received the same training as the prime crew. And Swigert had been instrumental in developing the procedures for command module emergencies. So actually they were lucky to have him along. That was my only sticking point to the movie. It made Swigert look like some greenhorn, when he was probably the guy who knew the most about the CSM. > [@Jadis](#): > > I believe it was done on a series (as in hundreds of runs) of flights where the plane did a steep climb and then a sudden dive…at the apex of the climb/dive switchover, there are a few seconds of weightlessness. I don’t think it was that many. Only about 2-3 minutes of actual zero-g footage made it into the movie. The rest was camera tricks, see-saws, and CGA. ---
**Author:** ![av8rmike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/edb3f5/32.png) [@av8rmike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/av8rmike)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2004, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972/34 "2004-08-30T15:45:29Z")
> [@](#): > > The rest was camera tricks, see-saws, and CGA. The filmmakers only had a four-color graphics adapter? Wow, it still looks amazing! 😉 One of my favorite movies as well. The first time I saw it, I took my then-girlfriend, also an engineer in college. Afterwards, when she said she didn’t like it because there was “too much engineering,” I knew she wasn’t the one for me. That’s like the emperor telling the composer, “Too noisy, my dear Mozart. Far too many notes.” ---
**Author:** ![Jadis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/87869e/32.png) [@Jadis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jadis)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2004, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972/35 "2004-08-30T17:07:54Z")
> [@Maus Magill](#): > > I don’t think it was that many. Only about 2-3 minutes of actual zero-g footage made it into the movie. The rest was camera tricks, see-saws, and CGA. Per the [IMDB trivia page for Apolla 13](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0112384/trivia): > [@](#): > > The cast and crew flew between 500 and 600 parabolic arcs in NASA’s KC-135 airplane (nicknamed the “Vomit Comet”) to achieve real weightlessness. Each of the arcs got them 23 seconds of zero gravity. All of these flights were completed in 13 days. ---
**Author:** ![Curate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/49beb7/32.png) [@Curate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Curate)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2004, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972/36 "2004-08-30T18:02:21Z")
The IMDB trivia site says: “Though not noted on screen, Marilyn Lovell’s “premonition” of an accident on her husband’s flight was triggered by her seeing the movie Marooned (1969)” I believe if I had a relative in that line of work I might have given that movie a miss. ---
**Author:** ![Saltire](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saltire/32/553_2.png) [@Saltire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saltire)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2004, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972/37 "2004-08-30T18:54:00Z")
> [@DooWahDiddy](#): > > … Jim Lovell’s wife gets to me every time… Me, too. I also love his mother–“If someone got a washing machine to fly, my Jimmy could figure out how to land it.” Has anyone heard _The Ballad of Apollo XIII_? It’s a filk to the tune of Gordon Lightfoot’s _Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald_, and amazingly detailed. The lyricist, William Warren Jr., manages to work in the exact mission times for events. The whole cassette [Minus Ten and Counting, by Off-Centaur Publications] it was on was great (the song is performed by Julia Ecklar), but it is impossible to get copies of it nowadays. I could only find the last verse anywhere on the net: “At Tee plus one hundred forty-three, fifty four Apollo Thirteen hit the waters Three men returned home, shaken up, but alive, To their wives and their sons and their daughters.” ---
**Author:** ![Mollie\_Magill](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mollie_magill/32/20882_2.png) [@Mollie\_Magill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mollie_Magill)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2004, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972/38 "2004-08-30T19:06:29Z")
> [@Jadis](#): > > Per the [IMDB trivia page for Apolla 13](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0112384/trivia): Maybe it was that many, after all. ---
**Author:** ![Anne\_Neville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Anne\_Neville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anne_Neville)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2004, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972/39 "2004-08-30T19:17:05Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > _Apollo 13_ is awesome. To achieve suspense on re-entry, when we know how it is going to come out, is fine filmmaking. I got to see _Apollo 13_ at the campus movie theater when I was in college, with Jim Lovell speaking before the movie was shown. He joked that his being there to speak to us was a bit of a spoiler, so I have put it in a spoiler box. 😉 I’m on the edge of my seat during the re-entry part every time I watch the movie (which has been many times, it’s one of my favorite movies). ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2004, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972/40 "2004-08-30T20:02:19Z")
Lovell’s mother was played by \*Ron Howard’s \* mother - and yes, he made his own Mom audition for the role. Lovell himself played the carrier captain in the final scene. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/apollo-13-the-movie/261972.md?page=3)