Apollo 13 vividly chronicles the most dramatic space flight in history which took place in April of 1970. Skipper Jim Lovell (Tom Hanks) was looking forward to a walk on the moon. Command module pilot Jack Swigert (Kevin Bacon) and lunar module pilot Fred Haise (Bill Paxton) were excited about their maiden voyage.
Then in the cold void of space the three astronauts' craft was crippled by a mysterious explosion. Mission Control in Houston, led by flight director Gene Kranz (Ed Harris), shifted gears and set out to devise a series of miraculous emergency improvisations. They were aided by Ken Mattingly (Gary Sinise) who had been scrubbed from the mission's crew after he was exposed to the measles.
Director Ron Howard hits all the emotional high spots in this pulse-pounding drama about the first critical experiment in space rescue. Apollo 13 salutes the patience, ingenuity, and courage of the astronauts and the creative efforts of Mission Control to bring them safely back to earth.