NEWS: Will this upcoming moon blockbuster cause Speedy stocks to rise even higher?

Andrew McUtchen

Ryan Gosling and a stellar cast, including Coach Taylor (Kyle Chandler of Friday Night Lights fame) and the Queen herself (Claire Foy), have the afterburners lit for a movie about the Moon that is set to rival Apollo 13 as a major motion picture event. It’s called First Man, and is billed as a Neil Armstrong biopic. The trailer looks crazy. I’ve watched it repeatedly today, and still find myself goosebumping at the last 15 seconds.

This comes in a week when I was incredibly honoured to actually hold the last watch that walked on the Moon, belonging to Eugene Cernan. More about that shortly in a video hot from the Omega Museum. Suffice to say, the closer you get to the story, the more power it has. This one will never go away.

While the story already has several tellings, the visceral direction by Damien Chazelle, who made jazz a bloodsport in Whiplash and made himself the toast of Hollywood with La La Land, already sets this version apart – it seems we will actually feel, like never before, the sheer impact and physical trauma the astronauts went through to take their giant leap.

Ryan Gosling and director/writer Damien Chazelle have reunited after *La La Land* to find new magic in the Moon story Image: Variety.com

Throughout the trailer there are glimpses of watches, Speedmasters most obviously. One can only guess at the surrounding watch placements, though given Gosling’s form – an unidentified ’50s Omega model in La La Land, a yellow gold Rolex ‘Bubbleback’ reference 3372 in Crazy, Stupid, Love and a 34mm automatic steel 1950s Seamaster in Song to Song – it’s possible it will be vintage Omega, and it’s also possible it will be the actor’s own watch.

Claire Foy, whose star was made in incredible series *The Crown* (a favourite around the T+T office), plays Neil Armstrong’s wife in *First Man*, alongside Ryan Gosling. Image: Vanity Fair

With the Rolex vintage market now, pun intended, so astronomically priced, it’s possible this ‘moment’ for the Moon story will have a flow-on effect to the vintage Speedy market. If you’ve got ’em, hold em; if you don’t, now might be a good time to suit up and hunt one down.

First Man hits screens on October 12, 2018.