Director: Theodore Melfi
Year Released: 2016
Rating: 2.0
Three women, human "computer" Katherine Johnson (Taraji P. Henson, 'nerdily' pushing up those glasses), programmer Dorothy Vaughn (Octavia Spencer) and soon-to-be engineer Mary Jackson (Janelle Monáe), face discrimination from their co-workers at NASA for not only being women (!) but for being African-American (!!) and have to prove themselves (good thing Kevin Costner is in there, recognizing intelligence when he sees it). You can group this in with 2016's Loving for being another Liberal Bait movie (meaning: pandering to the liberal consciousness) - it's relevant as a historical note (women are capable of being mathematically inclined, in case you didn't realize that) but not so much as drama, where some of the other close-minded NASA employees (particularly Kirsten Dunst and Jim Parsons) are there just to get pissy with the ladies: it's largely tension free, aside from the John Glenn flight and the whole Heat Shield button incident (as we know, Glenn came through it all right). Two of my favorite ladies of all time were damn good with technical matters, too: Lord Byron's daughter and that nude chick from the movie Ecstasy.
