“Apollo 18″ (2011)
Rating: 
Gremlins In Space
This movie probably deserves better than two-and-a-half stars. It’s not really that bad. But I’m knocking it down a bit because they took a great premise and ruined it.
The premise in this film is that footage from the last actual moon landing shows that there’s critters up there. That eat people. Kind of. It’s shot in the “mockumentary” style made (in)famous by the “Blair Witch Project,” which I’ve always felt was the reality TV equivalent for film-making. There’s simply no substitute for a good cast, good direction, and good cinematography.
So I knocked down my rating right there because what could have been a stark and eerie film ended up looking like . . . the “Blair Witch Project.” The concept was great – to suggest a reason for stopping the moon landings based on an alien threat instead of political bullshit is great. It kind of borrowed from “Alien” in that the Department of Defense is behind things and wants to investigate the aliens, regardless of the human cost.
But there are so many holes in the plot. A younger audience may not catch them, but us Baby Boomers who grew up with the actual moon landings sure will. For starters, no way in hell the Russians land on the moon undetected – NASA had so much hardware pointed up there it’s impossible that they go undetected. Ooops – guess that’s a spoiler. Oh well. It’s just as unlikely that the US and USSR cooperate on anything in 1973. The plausibility of sending up a manned mission just to rattle the alien’s cage is also absurd. Mission protocol would have scrubbed the whole deal as soon as communications were compromised. And if not then, certainly when the flag they planted goes missing . . . on the moon. The command module pilot would never have gone against orders and just winged it on a rescue attempt. The mission protocols for lunar operations wouldn’t have allowed the astronauts to wander off in the film like they did – this is the freakin’ moon they’re on. And, lastly, this bit about the Russian’s LEM being “almost like ours” is crap. The checklists and procedures to launch a LEM – any LEM – is immense. You don’t just go in there, flip a few switches, and just go into orbit. Utter rubbish.
All that being said, the special effects were decent and the writing was OK. The cast wasn’t great, but I’ve seen worse. To a contemporary audience – who’s more interested in Lady Gaga than in space exploration – and who actually likes reality TV – this film is probably awesome. To these deprived young people I say: go rent Kubrick’s “2001: A Space Odyssey” and watch it with a nice bottle of Absinthe – and then tell me you liked “Apollo 18.”
And that’s another reason I knocked it down a bit. The expectation. I was hoping for something that captured the vast emptiness of space and the stark terror of something going wrong out there. So, for me, this was a let down.
Still, even with all these problems it’s a decent enough end-of-summer movie. It’s at least a little thought provoking. It’s worth checking out at a a matinee when the price is a little lower – because you can’t really see much anyway with the whole hand-held-camera deal going on.
This work, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
Your comments are absolutely correct. Here are a few more technical problems and inconsistencies with this “found” footage:
1. The “Russian LM” could never have achieved a lunar orbit matching that of the Apollo command/service module without a long and painfully complex set of calculations and subsequent reprogramming of its main engine and thruster burn sequences. That strap-in-and-blast-off stuff looks good in a movie but it doens’t get you anywhere near your intended rendezvous point, which has to occur at the same height, speed and direction as the craft with which you are trying to dock.
2. Oh, yes, docking…well obviously the LM / CM docking would have been impossible (round peg – square hole) but I suppose a push-and-pray spacewalk with both craft depressurized and both doors open, might have worked. And perhaps the thrusters on the CM could have been used for a redo if the guy missed on the first try.
3. The Russian LM, if one existed, would undoubtedly have been designed similar to the Apollo LM. One of the hallmarks of the Apollo LM was its light weight. The walls of the craft were no thicker than than a few layers of aliminum foil – just enough to contain the 5 psi of pressure needed to sustain human life inside. The Russian LM in the movie looked like it was made from half-inch boiler plate, with massive rivets at the joints and seams. No way dude.
4. The motions of the astronauts and other objects inside the LM looked suspiciosuly like those under the influence of 1.0 G, not 0.18 G.
5. Real astronauts are very low on drama and very high on objective analysis. Lots of time spent taking care of technical housekeeping chores (bus B voltage reg looks good Houston; fuel cells are within spec and condensation on the cryo tanks is minimal). The guys with the right stuff don’t spend much time gazing out the windows and arguing like pre-teen siblings.
The docking attempt at the end was supposed to be an EVA – so they did at least realize that the docking mechanisms wouldn’t sync up.
Not only did he lift off in an LM he knew nothing about (other than accidentally finding the “start” button), but he somehow plotted an *intercept* course with the CM. Yeah. Right.
Yeah, I felt the way they were able to swing hammers around those LM’s and not completely rip ‘em to shreds was a bit much. The bashing on the hatch window at the end was almost funny.
The real astronauts were totally no-BS – just being there was high-risk – they don’t take extra chances for dramatic effect.