The new Neil Armstrong film, First Man, got a boffo premiere at the prestigious Venice Film Festival, with rave reviews for the movie and its Canadian star, Ryan Gosling.

But if you go to the film looking for an interesting interpretation of history, don't expect any American flag waving.  In fact, one of the most iconic moments in history is missing.  When Armstrong planted an American flag on the Moon, it acknowledged that while we went to the Moon for "all mankind," getting there was a singular American achievement of astonishing proportions.

So why no Stars and Stripes?

American Mirror:

The late Neil Armstrong's 1969 trip to the moon may have been "one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind," but it was also a massive achievement for the United States.

One of Armstrong's first orders of business was to proudly plant the American flag, after all.

But Ryan Gosling, the Canadian actor who plays Armstrong in "First Man," Hollywood's rendition of the moon landing, told the Telegraph the magic moment was intentionally omitted from the big screen because Armstrong's achievement "transcended countries and borders."

"First Man" is getting rave reviews at the Venice Film Festival, but critics noted the unpatriotically sanitized flick is missing something important, and Gosling explained he worked with French-Canadian director Damien Chazelle and the Armstrong family to decide on its key moments.

"I think this was widely regarded in the end as a human achievement (and) that's how we chose to view it," he said.  "I also think Neil was extremely humble, as were many of these astronauts, and time and time again he deferred the focus from himself to the 400,000 people who made the mission possible."

Was this really a "human achievement"?  Sure, it was.  So let's send a bill to every country in the world to help pay the $200 billion we spent getting there ($25 billion in 1967 dollars). 

American corporations designed the system that took us to the Moon.  American workers built it.  The American taxpayer paid for it.  And Americans flew the damn bird.  It is historically inaccurate and terribly, terribly unfair not to recognize the one nation that achieved the impossible dream of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to Earth.

We've seen "Captain America" films with no mention of America.  We've seen "GI Joe" movies that altered the story so that no mention of who GI Joe originally was is made.

Even Superman's iconic fight for "truth, justice, and the American way" was changed to just "truth and justice."  American culture dominates the world, and this upsets a lot of people overseas, as well as those in Hollywood who are far too urbane and sophisticated to wave a flag promoting their own country.

Airbrushing the flag out of history is about as silly and stupid as it gets.