The accomplishment of walking on the moon acted as a worldwide step forward; it was a great unifier.

Neil Armstrong’s first steps on the moon did more than enhance man’s understanding of space and technology. In the tumultuous 1960s, amidst war and significant social unrest, the space program served as a symbol of hope and progress worldwide.

In his documentary “In the Shadow of the Moon,” director David Sington interviews a handful of astronauts who participated in the first Apollo missions to the moon, including Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin and Mike Collins, who were on the Apollo 11 spacecraft, which landed on the moon first. Out of privacy concerns, Neil Armstrong did not participate in the film.

Sington places the documentary in the context of the late 1960, and includes scenes of the Kennedy brothers’ and Martin Luther King, Jr.’s assassinations, various protest marches, and B-52s dropping bombs on Vietnam. The space mission, which was created partly to compete with the Soviet Union during the arms race, became something far greater; a fundamental piece of history and a milestone in space exploration.

After the astronauts returned to Earth, they gave speeches about the experience in different countries, and Mike Collins recalls, “Everyone would say ‘We did it.’ Not the Americans—‘We did it.’” The accomplishment of walking on the moon acted as a worldwide step forward; it was a great unifier.”

The participants of the Apollo space missions—the only men who have ever seen Earth from the moon—talk candidly, and sometimes comically, about their fears. These ranged from possible shuttle malfunctions and televised mistakes, to even urinating in a space suit so not to distract from the experience of walking on the moon.

Many of the astronauts were graduates of top-notch flight schools, and the transition from a fighter pilot to an astronaut—and worldwide hero—was more than a little overwhelming.

Sington’s film is carefully researched. He includes scenes of the astronauts drawing up plans and building models of their spacecrafts in the beginnings of the program, CBS News footage of President Kennedy and President Nixon’s speeches, and spectacular shots of the moon, Earth and the shuttle’s liftoff from Cape Canaveral that were never digitally manipulated.

He does go into depth about space shuttle mechanisms and the function of the lunar module, which causes the film to lag a bit for viewers not familiar with astronomical terminology.

However, this also adds to his credibility as a historian and filmmaker.

The soundtrack is mainly classical music selection, but Sington also adds “Mr. Spaceman” by the Byrds, as well as other rock tracks.

“In The Shadow of The Moon” offers viewers an inside look at what it must have been like to travel hundreds of thousands of miles to an unknown frontier to see Earth in such a tiny, fragile context; and making history in the process.

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