The Aeronauts

The pursuit of Victorian science makes for great entertainment, and this film has its quota of well-to-do men in waistcoats tutting through their massive facial hair at the prospect of some scientific innovation. James Glaisher’s work with air balloons proved that the atmosphere had different levels, and he was a pioneer of forecasting the weather. This film removes his aeronaut partner Henry Coxwell and replaces him with a lady, Amelia Rennes, who is more of a fairground pilot—very much the showman to Glaisher’s studious scientist. This is not a big problem as Amelia represents a composite of several lady balloon pioneers of the time.

Glaisher and Rennes are played by Eddie Redmayne and Felicity Jones, reunited after portraying Stephen and Jane Hawking a few years ago. Amelia Rennes is very much the focus of the early part of the film: there are flashbacks to an unhappy time in her life, and anxiety makes her a little too unreliable for Glaisher. However the two get into a balloon and the story of their journey is intercut with more flashbacks about the events that put them in that situation.

Rennes’ entry to the field, crowded with enthusiastic spectators, is a stark contrast to her earlier nerves. She throws off any inhibitions and really puts everything into being an entertainer. It’s a side of Felicity Jones that isn’t what we’d expect: normally she keeps her determination under guard, except perhaps in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story; certainly she was a powerful part of what supported Stephen Hawking, and as the young lawyer Ruth Bader Ginsberg again there’s a studied determination.

This film is different, and so is her performance. Rennes and Glaisher ascend to a terrific height and argue about how far to go. Ultimately it falls to Amelia Rennes to save the balloon and both of their lives, and the role at this point is physically challenging to watch and emotional. It’s an unbelievable sequence that may not be for those who prefer to be on the ground. Although it is clearly computer generated, Amelia Rennes is perched precariously on the side of the freezing balloon at over thirty-thousand feet, trying to open a frozen vent to make the balloon go down. And it should be known that the actors did ascend to 8,000 feet—which is plenty!

The real James Glaisher

Movies about science always follow a fairly refreshing formula because, like in a good courtroom drama, the ending is happy or at least satisfying. It’s progress, and progress is good—right? This film about a scientist believing in a theory and pursuing its research at considerable personal risk to himself should perhaps make that point, and forcefully, because we live in times when there’s still the same tutting, but no waistcoats—it’s all on social media. And science is important. This is a film that mixes that discovery with a good stock of the personal sacrifices that people make—and this is what Amelia’s part of the story meant to me. Being able to forecast the weather seems so normal now, and people still moan when it’s supposedly “wrong” but this is a wonderfully colourful look at a scientific moment, with the feeling of genuine sacrifice along with a good deal of narrative quirkiness.