Apollo 10 ½: A Space Age Childhood Reviews

After all these years, I still have to watch ‘Waking Life’. On the other hand, I really loved ‘A Scanner Darkly’, so I was definitely eager to check this new animated feature from Richard Linklater, especially since it would be available on Netflix. Well, the damned thing turned out to be such a sweet nostalgic vintage slice of life and I thoroughly enjoyed it. To be honest, you might wonder if the animation genre was really required to tell this tale since it could have been just as well shot as a standard live-action feature but I think this choice made sense. Indeed, even if we think we have some clear memories from our childhood, it is actually always a heightened recollection of what actually happened and, with animation, there was no better way to convey this surreal feeling. Furthermore, I loved how Linklater looked back into such deep details into his childhood and it is really impressive how he managed to tell this story through the eyes of a young kid. I also really appreciate how he didn’t sugar-coat anything. Indeed, I think it’s pretty obvious that he loved his childhood but he was definitely not shy to show that not everything was perfect, even far from it, but it actually made the whole thing even more interesting to behold. Eventually, the only thing that didn’t really work for me was Stan pretending that he went on a secret mission on the moon a couple of months before Apollo 11. Sure, I do understand that the kid had a wild fantasy and was therefore fantasizing about taking part in this legendary mission but, as far as I was concerned, it didn’t really have any added value, especially since the main character was not apparently such a huge fan of the race to space or of NASA in general. Anyway, to conclude, even if it was maybe not a masterpiece, I really enjoyed the damned thing and I think it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in Richard Linklater’s work or if you like the genre.