Hidden Figures (2017)

Hidden Figures (2017)

IMDB Movie Rating  7.1/10

Based on a true story. A team of African-American women provide NASA with important mathematical data needed to launch the program's first successful space missions.

Director: Theodore Melfi

Writers: Allison Schroeder (screenplay), Theodore Melfi (screenplay

Stars: Taraji P. Henson, Octavia Spencer, Janelle Monáe |

PG | 2h 7min | Drama

 IMDB link Here

Hidden Figures Proves There’s Power in Numbers

Watching Taraji P. Henson, Octavia Spencer and Janelle Monáe is pure pleasure

In the grand scheme, numbers mean everything: Our very bodies are made of equations. Yet movies about people who deal in numbers—often foisted on us as spinachy, good-for-us entertainment during prestige-movie season—tend to be deadly dull. Who needs to see another white dude grab a piece of chalk and start writing feverishly on a blackboard?

But even if numbers are everywhere, they still have the capacity to surprise us. Hidden Figures, both a dazzling piece of entertainment and a window into history, bucks the trend of the boring-math-guy movie. Its characters are based on real-life people, a trio of African American math whizzes who also happened to be women, and who were employed by NASA in the early 1960s to help crunch crucial data for the first space missions. When Al Harrison (Kevin Costner), the harried engineer in charge of NASA’s groovily named Space Task Group, asks in exasperation, “We don’t have a single person in this entire building that can handle analytic geometry?” the unassuming woman who’s sent to his office is Katherine Johnson (Taraji P. Henson), a former child prodigy who has found work at Langley Research Center as a “computer,” the term given to women skilled at running calculations on an adding machine. (And because this is pre-integration Virginia we’re talking about, she’s dispatched from a room designated for “Colored Computers.”)

Katherine can do more than just run an adding machine, as she quickly proves. Even so, the obstacles she faces are almost as daunting as putting a man into space. Jealous, resentful colleagues (one of them played by The Big Bang Theory’s Jim Parsons) try to undermine her: She’s black and a woman, a double whammy their threatened white male egos just can’t handle. When she tries to pour coffee from the office’s communal coffee pot, her colleagues, all white and nearly all male, shoot knowing glances at one another—and the next day, a small, separate-but-supposedly-equal pot appears on the table, specifically for her use. The only restroom she’s allowed to use is in another building, a half mile away. She brings her work with her on these bathroom breaks, but that doesn’t matter. The round trip takes so long that her absence raises eyebrows.

Meanwhile, two of Katherine’s friends and colleagues at Langley steer around their own roadblocks: Utra-capable Dorothy Vaughan (Octavia Spencer) is doing the work of a manager, though her covertly racist boss (Kirsten Dunst) refuses to either promote her or pay her what she’s worth. And Mary Jackson (Janelle Monáe), another gifted mathematician, decides to make the leap to become an engineer—only to find that if it’s hard enough for a white woman to pull that off, it’s nearly impossible for a woman of color.

It’s one thing, though, to outline what Hidden Figures is about. It’s something else to bask in the movie’s spirit. Directed by Theodore Melfi (St. Vincent) and adapted from Margot Lee Shetterly’s book Hidden Figures: The Untold Story of the African American Women Who Helped Win the Space Race, the picture is buoyant and alert every minute. Henson, Spencer and Monáe all give superb, luminous performances: Watching them is pure pleasure. Even Katherine’s big writing-on-the-blackboard moment is different from similar scenes we’ve seen thousands of times before. Her drive to use numbers to show the world who she truly is has a specific and pointed context here: Numbers have no color, and no gender, either.

And when Katherine walks into the Space Task Group office for the first time—as a sea of white guys in identical white shirts and dark ties turn to stare at her, wondering what on Earth she’s doing there—the spirit of the room shifts perceptibly. She’s different from them, because she’s a woman and she’s black. In her simple, unassuming plaid dress and smart-girl cat’s-eye glasses, she’s about to challenge their world—and change it for the better. Hidden Figures brings that stealth triumph into the light, one number at a time

Read full review at Time

‘Hidden Figures’ Honors 3 Black Women Who Helped NASA Soar

“Hidden Figures” takes us back to 1961, when racial segregation and workplace sexism were widely accepted facts of life and the word “computer” referred to a person, not a machine. Though a gigantic IBM mainframe does appear in the movie — big enough to fill a room and probably less powerful than the phone in your pocket — the most important computers are three African-American women who work at NASA headquarters in Hampton, Va. Assigned to data entry jobs and denied recognition or promotion, they would go on to play crucial roles in the American space program.

Based on Margot Lee Shetterly’s nonfiction book of the same title, the film, directed by Theodore Melfi (who wrote the script with Allison Schroeder), turns the entwined careers of Katherine Goble (later Johnson), Mary Jackson and Dorothy Vaughan into a rousing celebration of merit rewarded and perseverance repaid. Like many movies about the overcoming of racism, it offers belated acknowledgment of bravery and talent and an overdue reckoning with the sins of the past. And like most movies about real-world breakthroughs, “Hidden Figures” is content to stay within established conventions. The story may be new to most viewers, but the manner in which it’s told will be familiar to all but the youngest.

This is not necessarily a bad thing. There is something to be said for a well-told tale with a clear moral and a satisfying emotional payoff. Mr. Melfi, whose previous film was the heart-tugging, borderline-treacly Bill Murray vehicle “St. Vincent,” knows how to push our emotional buttons without too heavy a hand. He trusts his own skill, the intrinsic interest of the material and — above all — the talent and dedication of the cast. From one scene to the next, you may know more or less what is coming, but it is never less than delightful to watch these actors at work.

 “Hidden Figures” effectively conveys the poisonous normalcy of white supremacy, and the main characters’ determination to pursue their ambitions in spite of it and to live normal lives in its shadow. The racism they face does not depend on the viciousness or virtue of individual white people, and for the most part the white characters are not treated as heroes for deciding, at long last, to behave decently. Two of them, however, are singled out for commendation: John Glenn, portrayed by Glen Powell as a natural democrat with no time for racial hierarchies; and Al Harrison, the head of Katherine’s group, for whom the success of the mission is more important than color.

Kevin Costner, who plays Al, is an actor almost uniquely capable of upstaging through understatement. He is also one of the great gum-chewers in American cinema, a habit that, along with the flattop haircut and heavy-framed glasses, gives Al an aura of midcentury no-nonsense masculine competence. He desegregates the NASA bathrooms with a sledgehammer and stands up for Katherine in quieter but no less emphatic ways when her qualifications are challenged.

It’s a bit much, maybe, but Mr. Costner, as usual, does what he can to give the white men of America a good name. The movie, meanwhile, expands the schoolbook chronicle of the conquest of space beyond the usual heroes, restoring some of its idealism and grandeur in the process. It also embeds that history in daily life, departing from the televised spectacle of liftoffs and landings and the public drama of the civil rights movement to spend time with its heroines and their families at home and in church. The sweetest subplot involves the romance between Katherine, a widow with three daughters, and a handsome military officer played by Mahershala Ali.

“Hidden Figures” makes a fascinating and timely companion to “Loving,” Jeff Nichols’s film about the Virginia couple who challenged their state’s law against interracial marriage, which was struck down by the Supreme Court in 1967. The two movies take place in the same state in the same era, and focus on the quiet dramas that move history forward. They introduce you to real people you might wish you had known more about earlier. They can fill you with outrage at the persistence of injustice and gratitude toward those who had the grit to stand up against it.

 Read full review at New York times

Movie Rating ★★★★

 ‘Hidden Figures’ explores NASA’s untold history with nerve and vivacity

The most gratifying qualities of “Hidden Figures” is how it bursts onto the screen like a shot of distilled, exhilarating joy. This bracing movie, about a group of brilliant African American women whose scientific and mathematical skills helped NASA launch its space exploration program in the 1950s and 1960s, gets off to a spirited start and rarely lets up, sharing with viewers a little-known chapter of history as inspiring as it is intriguing.

Some of the film’s most stirring scenes feature the hackneyed conceit of clueless white folk being enlightened by their African American educators, but Henson, Spencer and Monáe give them grit and knowing gravitas. If characters played by Jim Parsons and Kirsten Dunst sometimes seem too cruel to be true, they feature in some of the film’s most bluntly effective scenes. Costner is ideally suited to play the rumpled, constantly eating Harrison, portrayed here as a man too focused and distracted to have time for petty prejudices.

Attractively shot and designed and driven along by a catchy score by Pharrell Williams (who’s also a producer), “Hidden Figures” is pure pleasure to watch, with Melfi having as much fun with gorgeous period costumes and interior elements as with ratcheting up the tension as Glenn’s takeoff approaches. (It’s Katherine’s breathtakingly precise calculations that allow him to launch and land safely.) Viewers old enough to remember how that voyage went will find it infused with new suspense and energy this time around; those who don’t are in for an unforgettable ride.

With Glenn’s recent passing, “Hidden Figures” has taken on even more poignancy and timeliness. It’s difficult to imagine a more stirring way to honor his memory, as well as the courage and vision of the extraordinary women who helped him soar.

 Read full review at Washington post

Movie Rating ★★★★☆  

Black women Nasa boffin pic defies its formula

Nelson Mandela’s death was announced at the London premiere of biopic Long Walk to Freedom. That film under-performed critically, at the box office and when it came to awards. The producers of Hidden Figures will be hoping it’s not second time unlucky. Their movie about how three black female Nasa scientists helped send John Glenn into space premiered a couple of days after the death of the astronaut, aged 95.

But while the reignition of interest in Mandela did not lead to a dividend of tickets, that film was hobbled from the off – by lukewarm reviews, a formidable running time and Idris Elba’s striking lack of physical resemblance to the great man. Hidden Figures benefits from a tale few know, with a trio of leading characters almost nobody has heard of and – unlike the Mandela film – a total absence of solemnity.

This is something of a surprise: Hidden Figures’s other great asset is that although it looks like a movie machine-tooled to ride the wave of #OscarsSoWhite backlash, its actual ambitions seem far more modest: to entertain a lot, to educate a bit and to cheerlead pretty much constantly.

It’s semi-soap: the supporting characters at least are fleshed out to a barely skeletal extent. Dunst is dealt a harsh hand, but Jim Parsons fares even worse with his role as a snippy, racist colleague to Henson, forever rolling his eyes in unprogressive protest. Kevin Costner rides the waves of cliche with slightly more dignity as their superior: a man who cares only for the numbers, not the colour of those totting them up.

An extended riff depicting Katherine’s bladder trials as she must make the 40 minute round trip from her desk to the only loos on the campus designated for black women (often, horrifically, to the soundtrack of a new Pharrell Williams track called Runnin’) are among the most tonally askew in the movie. Yet Costner somehow manages to salvage some audience satisfaction from the affair, when he finally smashes down a segregated bathroom sign and declares: “At Nasa, we all pee the same colour.”

Glenn, too, is a clean-cut good guy: a trouper when he first meets the girls, distinguishing himself by coming over to shake their hands and gloriously vindicated in the final reel by his endorsement of Katherine’s addition assets.

The second film from Theodore Melfi, whose sole other credit, Bill Murray vehicle St Vincent, should have tipped us off sooner to the likely prevailing mood, Hidden Figures is a bouncy, almost garish feelgood girl pic. A movie that knows right from wrong and doesn’t see any use in complicating matters.

The performances are uniformly winning when they need to be and hissable when they don’t. There are scenes in which kids say the funniest things, bullies receive their comeuppance, hunky men propose in the cutest ways and we get impassioned monologues happy to sacrifice plausibility for whoopability.

Sometimes, it seems, agenda is better off taking second place to the pure pleasure of seeing just how fast a stacked deck can be demolished.

Read full review at The Guardian