TV REVIEW : A&E;’s ‘Apollo’ Fills in Details Film Misses

Like some other of Hollywood’s recent crew-stuck-in-crisis blockbusters, “Apollo 13” runs as smoothly as the machine its characters are stuck in--and about as coldly. Tellingly, when the machine in “Apollo 13” begins misbehaving, real panic sets in--and some of the humanity starts coming through.

Compared to the documentary, blow-by-blow account comprising “Crisis in Space: The Real Story of Apollo 13” on A&E;’s “20th Century” series, Ron Howard’s movie is a piece of humanistic melodrama. Since this Mike Wallace-hosted report fills in the scientific details that the movie is obliged to leave out, “Crisis in Space” is a solid guide before seeing the feature--but only if you know the dramatic outcome in advance.

Did commander Jim Lovell and partner Fred Haise have some lingering doubts about last-minute replacement John Swigert, and did they lash into each other after their command module was crippled due to an explosion in the service module’s oxygen tanks? This is where the movie takes its greatest license with the facts; “Crisis in Space” tells only of mildly testy exchanges between Lovell and National Aeronautics and Space Administration command headquarters.

The worst in-space crisis in NASA’s history was really a case of engineers improvising the design of a lifesaving craft that could keep the astronauts alive and be steered safely home without the loss of electricity and breathable air. Much of it was done with slide rules, cardboard, scissors, duct tape and pure instinct. Not even the observant Lovell expresses the irony of such a massive technological enterprise being salvaged by such humble means.

The humility extended to Lovell’s navigation skills: Like 15th-Century explorers, he used heavenly bodies rather than numbers to guide his course. The movie better depicts this detail, but because “Crisis in Space” is made of nicely edited CBS news clips, the sense of a worldwide TV audience hanging on to every moment is stronger here. Those clips contain a wonderful nostalgic boost since they include CBS’ you-are-there animation of Apollo 13 in action.

Looking back 25 years from the near-tragedy, these were the finest hours of NASA, and the coolest hours of CBS.

* “Crisis in Space: The Real Story of Apollo 13” airs at 7 and 11 tonight on A&E.;