Some pretty amazing women doing extraordinary things in challenging times.

This is a damn good movie.

Agreed. One of my favorite movies.

Good characters and dialogue. I always enjoy watching it.

Yes, I enjoyed it as well.

It's an outstanding movie.

Then I read the book, and I'm still impressed. The events in real life took place over the course of years, but that would not translate as well into a movie. In all, I think they did a great adaptation from book-to-film, and while they got some of the facts wrong, the spirit of the book was very well captured by the film.

All three ladies were outstanding actors. I could even watch the guy who plays Sheldon on Big Bang Theory and not think of him as Sheldon for most of the movie. . .

Yes splendid movie. I'm afraid Jim Parsons will never live down the iconic role of Sheldon Cooper. Much like the great Larry Linville.

I enjoyed the movie and have watched it more than a few times when I stumble across it on broadcast. Love the crowbar scene.

Michael

If we're channel surfing & it's on, we'll choose it, regardless of how far into it, it is.

Ii also thought it was very good.

Never heard of it.

quote:

The story of a team of female African-American mathematicians who served a vital role in NASA during the early years of the U.S. space program.

Oh, yeah, we need more of this kind of stuff. How oppressed and marginalized were they?

It was the 60's in the South and the women were treated very badly.

There's very little you can tell me about Southern culture in the 1960s. I lived it.

The facts were not accurately portrayed in this film. There were no separate bathrooms for black people at these facilities. Certainly, no one had to "run a half mile" to get to a bathroom. Ridiculous.

Just read these reviews:

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4.../reviews?ref_=tt_urv

Typical Hollywood emotional manipulation and pandering. PC bullshit. Whitey is evil, all black people are saints.

Good movie but, sadly, Hollywood must tinker with facts maricam23 January 2017

I really enjoyed watching Hidden Figures. The story was compelling and laid out neatly for our viewing pleasure. It shone a spotlight on a part of history with which I wasn't familiar. And, most importantly, it made me want to learn more about Katherine Goble Johnson, Mary Jackson, and Dorothy Vaughan. What a shame the screenwriters felt they had to preach at me about racism rather than just tell the true story of these amazing and talented women. They weren't amazing and talented "in spite" of being black or "in spite" of being women, they were just amazing and talented in their own right. One day, perhaps, Hollywood will get a clue and give audiences credit for having a brain.

Much of the atmosphere of racism in the movie did not ring true for me. In many cases it didn't even make sense, so I looked into it. The first question I had for the internet was "Did Katherine Goble have to run half a mile to use a bathroom on the NASA complex?" The answer is no. For more info on the conditions and life of Katherine Johnson check out the interview with her here: https://youtu.be/r8gJqKyIGhE. In particular check out 11:49 where she says she "didn't feel segregation". Everyone was working. The job was important and they weren't going to jeopardize the mission with foolish racist antics. She was part of a team. I would've liked to have heard so much more about Katherine and her mind and work, less about the social issues of the 1960s!

I understand screenwriters have to condense a large amount of information into a couple of hours but the ham-handed and, let's be honest, false representation of racism at NASA and the treatment of these women was a repeated and unwelcome intrusion into what should have been a very interesting and educational movie about such remarkable women. For example: I strongly suspect Katherine Goble never, ever would have been so unprofessional as to scream at her boss and co-workers like she does in what Hollywood probably sees as a "cathartic" scene. It was completely out of character and a distraction from what should have been the real story, that of Katherine's accomplishments. Goble was a conscientious and intelligent woman who would've never done such a thing which, to my way of thinking, says a lot more about her than this silly, manufactured scene.

But I don't want to run the risk of being just as ham-handed in my review and I'll leave my criticism at that. I'll only add, don't let the prospect of being bludgeoned by an anti-racism message keep you from going to see Hidden Figures.


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Overt Agenda lianzantoro27 March 2019

In 1961, three Black female geniuses ( Katherine Johnson, Dorothy Vaughan, and Mary Jackson) work for NASA. We can tell it's 1961 by the ubiquitous pictures of JFK. The three work as human computers doing calculations.

Katherine is a mathematician who is basically Einstein without the crazy hairdo. Mean White people are mean to her. They mistake her for a janitor, make her drink coffee from a separate pot, and worst of all, force her to walk half a mile in the rain while carrying a bunch of folders, just to go pee. Sheldon from The Big Bang Theory is particularly mean to Katherine. He's always trying to take credit for her work. Katherine is clearly the smartest person in all of NASA. Kevin Costner is Katherine's boss, who destroys the colored bathroom sign, thus freeing up her genius and enabling her to get John Glenn into orbit. John Glenn was in his forties at that time, but the actor playing him looks like Scut Farkas from A Christmas Story. NASA probably would've had to shut down if it wasn't for Katherine. Sheldon ends up subjugated to Katherine and serving her coffee.

Dorothy is a mechanical genius who can fix cars just by magically touching the engine with a screwdriver. Kirsten Dunst is mean to Dorothy, and won't let her get a promotion. When NASA gets a new computer, (that is too big to fit through the door), the White doofus programmers don't have a clue how to get the thing to work. Dorothy can get the computer functioning just by magically touching a wire. Dorothy gets promoted to supervisor and gets to act sanctimonious towards Kirsten Dunst. Dorothy is clearly the second smartest person at NASA.

Mary is an engineering genius who can't get promoted to engineer because of mean White people. She has to go to court to fight for the right to go to engineering school. The mean White judge really doesn't want to allow her admission into the school, but Mary wins him over with sassy Black girl attitude. I believe she later went on to invent the internet. Mary is clearly the third smartest person at NASA.

Hidden Figures is a plodding, predictable, Howard Zinnesque soap opera of Whites oppressing Blacks, which is mostly fictitious. The three women really existed and really did work at NASA. But all they did was work in groups doing tedious calculations in pre computer times. Katherine Johnson stated that she was treated well and didn't face any discrimination. This film is nothing more than post "Oscar so White" agitprop. It would almost work as an absurdist comedy if it's intentions weren't so deplorable.


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if you are a hammer, everything is a nail, this is revisionist history joeyford-5534229 August 2019

It didn't happen like this at all. there were no separate bathrooms. the prejudice wasn't there so strong. it is all told to make you feel like you are watching ROOTS. this is from someone whose best friend had a dad at NASA at this time. Silly movie made for award shows.



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A film so concerned with being a political statement that it forgets to be a good film. trublu21529 December 2016

Hidden Figures tells the story of three African American women in the late sixties as they become instrumental to NASA in putting John Glen on the moon. Directed by Theodore Melfi and stars Taraji P. Henson, Octavia Spencer, Kevin Costner and Kirstin Dunst, Hidden Figures would be a good film had it not been so concerned with the idea of the empowerment of women that it forgot to be a good, engaging film. It has the proper ingredients to become a heavy hitter but trades it in using its excellent cast as more of a political statement than anything else.

The film starts off by introducing us to Katherine Johnson, Dorothy Vaughn, and Mary Jackson (Henson, Spencer and Janelle Moàne) in almost the exact same ways. We see that Katherine is a number cruncher and a brilliant woman all around...then the exact same character traits are rehashed for Spencer and Moàne's characters. There is nothing different between the women, there are 3 of the same character in one film. The only difference between the three is Taraji P. Henson's excellent performance that makes her thoroughly enjoyable throughout a film that would have been a direct-to-digital film otherwise. The film does very little to give any development to these women and keeps drowning us in the notion that "this is girl power." It became extremely redundant after awhile and left me waiting for the film to get serious but it never did. This is a film that is more about what the characters did rather than how and why they did it.

Overall, Hidden Figures is a bland film with paper thin characters that tries to make more of a political statement rather than make a good film. This is a perfect example of political climate affecting creative endeavors. If there were anything I could say it is: if you're going to see the film, see it for no other reason than Taraji P. Henson's excellent performance. Taking her out of this film in any way, shape or form would have probably stopped this film in the development process but then again, maybe that is where this should have stayed.


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More politically correct but historically incorrect lies. grag_dane16 August 2017


even in 1969, NASA and the federal government would have been proud to show off any black contributions to the moon landing. By highlighting black contributions to the Apollo program, NASA could have kept blacks from singing songs like Gil Scott-Heron's "Whitey on the Moon" (which bemoaned how a rat could bite the black singer's sister while white people were on the moon). But this didn't happen.

Why didn't someone from NASA bring up Katherine Johnson back then to counter this negative publicity? Because her contributions were so insignificant no one with NASA noticed them enough to highlight them. Which is why Hidden Figures matters and must be lavished with awards and praise. It creates a new narrative, completely devoid of truth, about black participation in man's greatest achievement even in the face of discrimination. It's a narrative for a certain audience—it should be noted women made up 64 percent of the opening weekend audience, with minorities representing 57 percent of those seeing the film—want to hear. Yet surely audiences wanted to believe it in 1969 as well. Katherine Johnson, were her contributions so vital, could have been the much-needed minority public relations asset to parade around to the media back then. But her value as a symbol was limited— because her contributions were trivial.And she can only be brought up now because the real truth about black opposition to the space program has been hidden in plain sight.


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This movie doesn't care about their achievements, just their race. tygvai8 January 2017

If you want to go to the theater and learn all about three genius and incredibly historic women that history forgot, hidden figures is not for you. If you want to see yet another movie about how race relations in the early 60's were awful, and hear more and more and more about how racism and sexism is bad, than this is the movie for you.

Among two and a half long hours of pointless personal life drama, close-up shots on signs that read "COLORED ONLY", and an engineer refusing to co- author papers, you will find short snippets of what this movie both could and should have been, a story about intelligent women with important contributions to one of humanity's greatest achievements. I really wanted to go into this movie and learn about these women, but because the writers and directors cared more about telling us all about events and ideologies we already knew about, I can't even remember their names after just getting out of the theater.

Here are some examples of how they overly drill in that racism is bad, just in case we didn't already know, all while adding nothing to the story:

-A scene with anti-segregation protesters being attacked by police with dogs

-News report about the firebombing of a freedom riders bus

-Mother and child just about running away from a water fountain when a black man uses the one next to theirs

-A sarcastic remark about racism/sexism from one of the main characters every few seconds

-About five scenes where a black person walks into a room full of white people, and they all stop and stare at the black person

In a documentary about racism and segregation during the civil rights movement, all of those would fit perfectly in, but in this movie, they just add to the run time and force you to have to search for the few times where the movie teaches us anything about the titular hidden figures.

I desperately wanted to like this movie, but all in all, I have to give this movie a 3/10 because this movie doesn't care about the main character's achievements, just their race.



There are currently 556 reviews of this film on IMDB. I could probably post scores of reviews from this film which make essentially the same point. Take a look for yourself.