After tackling music school in Whiplash and then a classic Hollywood musical in La La Land, Oscar-winning filmmaker Damien Chazelle is headed into space for his upcoming film First Man. The film chronicles the life of astronaut Neil Armstrong and the years leading up to the Apollo 11 mission that made him the first man to walk on the moon, and now the movie has a dramatic new trailer.
Universal Pictures released the latest trailer for First Man just as the first reviews of the film began filtering out of the Venice Film Festival, where it premiered in late August. The trailer offers a look at Ryan Gosling as Armstrong, the aeronautical engineer who went on to become the first civilian astronaut to fly in space, and later participated in the first manned moon landing in July 1969.
Chazelle directs First Man from a script penned by Spotlight screenwriter Josh Singer, another Academy Award winner, with a story (and title) inspired by James Hansen’s biography First Man: A Life Of Neil A. Armstrong.
Along with Gosling as Armstrong, the film’s cast features Dawn of the Planet of the Apes actor Jason Clarke as Ed White, the first American to walk in space; The Crown star Claire Foy as Janet Shearon, Armstrong’s first wife; Kyle Chandler (Friday Night Lights) as Deke Slayton, one of the original Mercury Seven astronauts; Corey Stoll (Ant-Man) as Buzz Aldrin, the second man to walk on the moon; and Lukas Haas (The Revenant) as Michael Collins, the Command Module pilot for Apollo 11.
The film’s ensemble cast also includes Shea Wigham (Kong: Skull Island), Christopher Abbott (James White), Brian d’Arcy James (13 Reasons Why), Pablo Schreiber (Orange is the New Black), Cory Michael Smith (Gotham), Ethan Embry (Sneaky Pete), and Patrick Fugit (Outcast).
Behind the camera for First Man is much of Chazelle’s team from La La Land, which also starred Gosling and was nominated for 14 Academy Awards. The 2016 film earned Chazelle his first Academy Award and made him the youngest winner of an Oscar in the “Best Director” category.
Although the film is currently in the midst of festival screenings, First Man makes its U.S. theatrical debut on October 12.
