Hello everyone! 🙂
Welcome to ‘Bradley’s Basement’ blog and I’m Tim Bradley!
I’ve seen the film ‘The Aeronauts’ starring Felicity Jones and Eddie Redmayne at the cinema. This was my Dad’s birthday present film for 2019. He greatly enjoyed it! I greatly enjoyed it too! So did my Mum! It was worth going to see and it felt like a proper adventure film inspired by true events in 1862.
‘The Aeronauts’ is about Amelia Wren and James Glaisher. These two people go on an epic adventure as they travel the skies via a gas balloon. They face physical and emotional challenges during their adventure. It soon becomes a fight for survival whilst they make some pretty extraordinary discoveries.
As always, I become fascinated when getting introduced to new things in an historical drama via TV or film. It was fascinating to see this film and be introduced to weather scientist James Gleaisher who asks daredevil balloon pilot Amelia Wren to join him on a huge adventure in the skies via a gas balloon.
I also enjoyed Felicity Jones and Eddie Redmayne’s performances in the film. They’ve worked together before in the film ‘The Theory of Everything’. I’ve also seen Felicity Jones in ‘Rogue One: A Star Wars Story’ and 2007’s ‘Northanger Abbey’ and I’ve seen Eddie Redmanye in the ‘Fantastic Beasts’ movies.
I’m not sure how much of this film is historically accurate, but it was still pretty fascinating to see. It’s based on the 2013 book ‘Falling Upwards: How We Took to the Air’ by Richard Holmes; with the screenplay and story by Jack Thorne and Tom Harper as well as the film being directed by Tom Harper.
I enjoyed how James and Amelia did their adventure. Amelia is daring and excited by the thrills of the adventure whilst James is conducting scientific meteorological experiments. They see many wonders whilst up in the balloon such as little butterflies as well as being in the white clouds of a clear blue sky.
It got tense when they had to overcome obstacles and were getting higher and higher. This includes getting caught in a dangerous rainstorm as well as avoiding getting lost in space when the balloon’s freezing all over. I literally held my breath as Amelia climbed to the top of the balloon to ‘unfreeze’ it.
I liked the emotional moments featured in the film. ‘The Aeronauts’ isn’t exactly a love story between James and Amelia, though it easily could be. Amelia had a tragic past with losing her husband during a previous balloon flight. There are flashback scenes with Amelia reluctant to do another balloon flight.
There are also flashback scenes where James is ridiculed by fellow scientists on his theories to predict the weather and going on a balloon flight to prove those theories. It was interesting how James persuaded and encouraged Amelia to be his pilot during the balloon flight while doing his experiments.
As well as Felicity Jones and Eddie Redmayne, the film also features Himesh Patel as John Trew, James’ friend. There’s also Tom Courtenay (who I’ve seen in the BBC production of ‘Little Dorrit’ and the 2016 ‘Dad’s Army’ movie) as Arthur Glaisher, James’ father and Anne Reid as Ethel Glaisher, James’ mother.
There’s also Phoebe Fox as Antonia, Amelia’s sister and Vincent Perez who appears in the film’s flashbacks as Pierre Wren, Amelia’s husband. There’s also Tim McInnerny as Airy, a fellow scientist and Rebecca Front as Amelia’s Aunt Frances. I also saw Robert Glenister as Ned Chambers in the movie. 😀
‘The Aeronauts’ is a highly recommended film to see at the cinema. I know it’s yet to be seen in the USA in December, but I assure you it’s worth watching. Felicity Jones and Eddie Redmayne are brilliant together in this film and it’s a fascinating, thrilling adventure inspired by true historical events.
Thanks for reading!
Bye for now!
Tim. 🙂
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