I don't know how "rare" some of this footage is, as I have seen every bit of it at one point or another during the last 48 years, from Ed White's space walk to the photos of Earth taken by various Shuttle crews. It did, however, reveal something that I never knew - that the Saturn 5 launch was so violent the pad was still steaming when the astronauts had returned home and were being given their ticker tape parades. This video is no better than one of those "tribute" things that we see ad nauseum on Youtube. The Smithsonian is capable of better than this.

I think if we drop the "fact about facts" this video is a nice piece of work and soundtrack and reverse slow-mo is excellent addition. it takes you there and makes you think deeper, more thoroughly about how much effort whole "rocket science" is for humanity, how much sacrifice and effort has been made, and how important this is plus first and foremost how much heroism+ intellect it requires. and after you thought of that you afre free to slur and hide behind the fact that you DID not do it and jst watched it and did not understand it. :)

@Jim Kelsey: The SAME "Ed White" who was killed on Apollo I? Yes. Amazing that he was EVA-ing on Apollo 11. Also cool: The launch pad was still smoldering as the crew, once returned to earth, were honored in a parade. Seriously...the video is really cool. (Despite the weird edits and freaky music.)

This footage is so rare, it shows us that Ed White was walking in space at the same time as Apollo 11 flew! Amazing that something linked to the Smithsonian can incorporatesuch a gaff, which will mislead youngsters that don't even have the facts as memories. Time and again I have seen film makers with no knowledge or care for the factual side of things. Food for the conspiracy theorists idiots.

Cool Soundtrack!!! Very appropriate

I appreciate all of the hard work that has been put into this site,

I worked on the 44,000 lb. Hold Down Arm (HDA) system for Boeing. If you look close the protective hood on one of the HDA did not close! We had to strengthen the aluminum tab that connected the rope from the HDA hood to the rocket for the rest of the Saturn V launches.

Nice video, but extremely annoying soundtrack.,

Had to turn the "music" off. So very awful! Much better with the sound off. And the one person who thought Kubrick would be proud has utterly forgotten that most of the majestic music used in "2001: A Space Odyssey" was sweeping classical. We all remember fondly that huge space station turning to the strains of the "Blue Danube". Chuck the noisy, discordant sound that purports to be music, and get a good foley artist instead. NOTHING beats the sound of a Saturn 5 taking off! THAT's real majesty!!!

Why did you have to put that God awful "music" at the beginning??

Remember when the USA was great? Compare that with the Too Big to fail Banks.

@Stephane B -- Don't know where you're coming from. This is an amazing video that reminds us of the majesty and incredible engineering of the early space race. I love the slow pace and the monumental music (Kubrick would approve). Thanks for sharing, Smithsonian.

Enjoyed the video, thanks. All these bitter comments above mine are hilarious. Thanks for the entertainment.

Boring video, terrible music.

Very moving. Thanks.

Thanks for the recommendation, Susan. I will look up National Geographic's 'For All Mankind.'

Why were there no shots of the astronauts on the moon? This all seemed like "plenty of nothing." And there was no coherence, no "story," no reliving of the key and crucial focus of the whole project: human beings on the moon. Or didn't that really happen?

What a load of whoee. One of the biggest hoax's ever pepetrated, next to 911 and a few others that is..

interlacing?!?! what a freakin' joke.

German Engineering at its best!

Cmon... Interlacing Artifacts... Seriously? They clean up this video from the 60's, probably from scanned film, introduce interlacing... for some reason, then don't take it out for web? If it's HD it should be progressive anyways. Did a professional make this? Disappointing.

I turnd the sound off-it was sooo annoying and the images of the launch pad went on too long so I hit fast forward, but it did spark my interest in looking for more interesting footage on the worldwide web!I'm sad this generation wont get to experience something like this.

What's the video of the orbital EVA doing in this piece? Apollo 11 included no orbital EVAs. Smithsonian, please take this video down from your site. You can do better.

Perfect example of why we could never go to the moon today, with the available 'talent' from gen. 'Z'. This "piece" would have received an F, in my fifth grade film editing class. Hey, you gen Z ers, you are completely incompetent, uneducated, lost and hopeless.. Now, go play a computer game.

Frank, I'm having a sick headache... Frank, I'm having a sick headache... Really? My 13 year old could have made a better video. What a waste.

Neat video...but HORRIBLE music

I turned the music (noise) way down. It was nice to see some of the old footage. I can remember the house shaking in Daytona Beach minutes after the Saturn V lifted off! I think NOVA editors might of assembled the remix more to my liking....

Disappointing. Just old video cleaned up and disorganized at that. I agree with Karen, a lousy soundtrack. I too remember the adventure as I was 17. I hope the taxpayers didn't finance this piece of garbage.

I remember my parents waking me up to watch footage of the moon landing in '69. What a brilliant effort this video is. The music makes it!

While interesting, this compilation was not edited very well, with images out of sequence and FAR too much footage of the burning launch pad, not to mention the annoying soundtrack. I remember watching everything about the American space program on television, from Alan Shepard's flight (I was in the first grade then) to Neil Armstrong's first steps on the Moon; and I tried to watch as many of the Shuttle launches as I could. This "lost footage" has novelty value, but for an excellently-done compilation of all of the Apollo missions, I recommend National Geographic's "For All Mankind", narrated by the astronauts themselves in their own words.

Karen has valid criticisms. I was at KSC for the Apollo 11 lift-off and there was so much more to the launch than the paint being seared from the platform. Long shots of the ignition sequence would have caught the migration from dirty oranges and reds to bright yellows and whites, the formation of cumulus clouds of steam billowing up around the vehicle. The Saturn did not "leap" up as did the shuttle, with its solid outriggers -- rather, the launch was slow, majestic, requiring nearly ten seconds to achieve full power on the liquid engines. And the noise -- it was tangible, not just audible. The soundwaves rattled and banged about in your nostrils and lungs. Shock diamonds formed in the hot exhausts and the Saturn burned a neat round hole in a cirrus cloud as it passed (a first). The crowd's reactions -- the tears and the giddy laughter -- stand out in my memory. I wish there had been more of all that and less Blade Runnerish soundtrack....

I agree with Karen's post. Especially about the annoying sound track.

Absolutely dead-on comment! The burning launch pad was obviously used to "stretch" the video events, such as they were!

I don't think I could criticize this mess of a video any better than Karen did. I think it could be tossed into the smoldering launch pad. Yes, I was alive when spaceships carrying men routinely went to and from the moon. It was astonishing and exciting and I'll never forget what we accomplished back then when reaching out into space meant something other than achieving low earth orbit. This clip doesn't even come close to capturing that adventurous era. I imagine the music is something that was (is?) used to torture extremists held in US concentration camps.

I agree 100%! The soundtrack is deadly dull, and the out-of-sequence shots of the burning launch pad emphasized the abysmal discontinuity of the whole video. What could have been a memorable record of an earth-changing event became quite forgettable. GT, July 27, 2012

I agree with Karen completely. This one of the dumbest mind numbing videos I have ever seen. The Smithsonian was duped and should be embarrassed. It should be removed immediately.

Can't believe I wasted six and a half minutes to watch this garbage. Was the RARE unseen footage, the footage of the launchpad burning? Really, come on. I have already seen the rest of the footage, numerous times. I expected more than this from Smithsonian. As Karen posted, the music is terrible. And to skip over Neil Armstrong's first step on the Moon. Really??? The launchpad burning and the parade was more important??? WOW I also lived through this event. I remember my Mother waking me up to watch Neil Armstrong take his first step on the Moon. I ran outside to look at the Moon. I understood, as young as I was, that at that moment, when I looked at the Moon, there were actual people on the Moon. I felt that I was a part of one of the most important events in human history. The Apollo program was something that the American people took pride in. We stopped what we were doing, to watch the launches and the splashdowns, and kept track of everything in between. America needs something like this again, to make us proud of our accomplishments! How about a manned mission to Mars?

Always great to see footage from the Apollo 11 mission, but have to agree with Karen on the choice of music....

Honest, Fire his/her. This is the worst cutting job I have ever seen, ever! There is nothing there. The cuts are well out of sequence. The spectators appear to be looking to the sky and the next picture shows the Saturn not yet off the pad. The person doing the remix is bad at sequencing, audio, and made poor choices with the spectators, and mission control adding wasted seconds. Pull this video as it gives NASA a bad name. Look at original footage from them if you want to see something truly spectacular.

Remixed in HD?? How about re-framed in 16x9? there's nothing HD about this stuff. And couldn't agree more with the comment above on the soundtrack. Somebody wasted a lot of time on this one....

Karen- I could not have put it any better myself. I too lived during this wonderful period in time. I was in 5th grade- our entire school stopped, listened and watched as these men (strapped atop millions of gallons of volitale fuel) were shot to the moon. My dad was in the Navy and overseas at the time. I came home and we had neighbors over to watch our new color TV. Although most of what we saw was b/w and grainy at best... my minds eye could only imagine the courage these men had and what it must look like to them. So many things were unknown at the time and so much speculation about what would happen to them. Yet, onward they went. Paving the way for so much more yet to come. It is a memory that I've often shared with my own children. Always reach for the stars. Cliff

I agree with Karen and was very disappointed I wasted six and half minutes watching the launch pad burning, and listening to that awful background music I expected far more regarding this amazing and historic event.

Not to pile on… but completely agree with Karen, not impressive. Nor was it all Apollo 11 footage. There was no space walk during the Apollo 11 mission. Yet this piece had a shot of a space walk. Probably the late Ed White.

Agreed, Karen.

I'm sure if they really tried, they could have made this clip more annoying but, it would have been difficult. I pity the editor who had to listen to this over and over again.

I must agree with Karen. As a young boy in the '60's, I was fascinated by the space program and eagerly followed every single mission. I recall vividly awaking early on the morning of the launch of Apollo 11 then camping out in front of the television the whole day. The actual landing was a mesmerizing experience. This video rekindled none of my childhood memories. And that soundtrack was most annoying.

Karen, I agree with you 99%.... the missing 1% being your egregious misuse of the word "enormity"! :-)

Terrible video, sound track made me sick, showed a Gemini mission sapce walk and rediculuous anountf time showing the MLP getting blasted. Some thing grade schoolers would hae made up in an art class. Disgrace to the astronauts and the Apollo program.

Only one comment so far? Like comment #1, I was also not impressed. Did I see see pictures of Mars in this video? Well anyway.

I agree with Karen. The sound was very annoying. There wasa a lot of audio from the mission which would have been nice to hear. Who cares about the launch pad after the rocket has left? There is a lot of good video available which shows more interesting action and should have been used.

well said, Karen

The first Karen expresses my thoughts exactly. There were so many memorable moments that could have been addressed that were forgone because of the burning launch pad. I don't know what the idea was in the creator of this film to include so much footage of the launch pad. Maybe he just liked the flames.

Not impressed at all. First of all: the person who chose the soundtrack for this video should be given a life sentence in a tin can and have this soundtrack played 24-7. Secondly: the remix should have been left in the can and the original footage shown. I think if I had seen the shot of the launch pad burning one more time, I would have barfed. The most memorable part of the footage was sorely neglected. I lived through this exciting time and to have men actually fly to the moon was amazing. The thrill of exploration beyond the boundries of earth was like having your favorite Ray Bradbury novel come to life and witnessing it. It was that drive in humans to explore the unknown which had not been seen since the pioneers explored the west. I remember the news coverage of this event and the pictures of the earth and moon like it was yesterday. This video could have been mixed so much better. It did not do justice to the enormity of the event.