Filmed in the mockumentary style of The Blair Witch Project or Cloverfield, the film was made using handheld and fixed location cameras. It is based around the premise that the lost footage of the final manned mission to the moon had been discovered and edited to show what took place.
There’s a Reason we Never Went Back
Officially Apollo 18 was just one of several cancelled missions to the moon, however, in 2011 the footage of that mission was discovered and released. The footage was not added to, the filmmakers only reedited the footage in order to create the film the audience is about to watch.
In December 1974, three astronauts led by Commander Nathan Walker, along with Lieutenant Colonel John Grey and Captain Benjamin Anderson are told that they are going to be going to the moon on Apollo 18. The mission is being overseen by the Department of Defense and has been classified as top secret.
Therefore, in secret, the three are launched into space. Walker and Anderson successfully detach from the command module Freedom leaving Grey onboard, whilst they manage to land safely on the surface of the moon onboard the landing craft Liberty.
On their first day the mission is initially routine as the two set up some Defence Department equipment but whilst exploring the surrounding area they discover a dead cosmonaut and a Soviet LK Lander. Officially the Russians never made it to the moon, Walker and Anderson query the presence of the lander, but are told to simply continue their mission.
On the second day they are preparing to leave when the Liberty is damaged and whilst surveying the outside Walker starts screaming and turns around just in time for Anderson to glimpse a spider-like creature crawling inside his helmet.
The nightmare is just beginning as Walker and Anderson try to escape the moon’s surface and meet up with Grey in Freedom as their oxygen dwindles and the strange creatures on the lunar surface become increasingly aggressive.
Last Manned Mission
In recent years filmmakers have started favouring the ‘mockumentary’ style of filming, and in some cases claiming that the footage was not shot using actors. The Blair Witch Project was the pioneer of this technique, with J.J. Abrams adopting it for the hugely successful Cloverfield. In Apollo 18 this technique is employed again, the opening sequence informs the audience that everything they are about to see is real, however, fans of Stargate Atlantis may recognise Ryan Robbins (who plays John Grey) as Genii soldier Ladon Radim which essentially blows the whole ‘this is based upon real footage’ claim out of the water.
Acting wise the three main cast members do a reasonable job of convincing the audience that they are really stuck on the moon with very little, to no chance, of returning and the grim realisation of exactly why they were sent up there in the first place.
The main problem with Apollo 18 is that it really lacks any real scares, there are a few moments when the audience will jump, but like most horror films they are jumps that the audience will see coming from a mile away. The creatures themselves would probably be frightening if they were crawling around inside a space suit, but inside the lunar lander, a moon boot should be more than sufficient to deal with them as would a fly swatter if anyone had thought to bring one. In addition the posters made it seem as though a three toed creature left an imprint in the lunar surface when in the film, not once are tracks like that actually seen, which suggests such gimmicks were used simply to bring people to the cinema without worrying about what those people would think of the film.
Whilst there are more problems with Apollo 18 than someone could shake a stick at, the biggest without a doubt is the overhanging question of how exactly the footage was recovered. It was done on film cameras, which at one point one of the astronauts is loading into a bag as evidence of what has been happening, and considering the ending (which is not exactly hard to guess) will leave the audience to wonder how any of the footage they have just sat through was actually recovered. It may have been that the handheld cameras were actually recording and streaming back to Earth, which considering 1974 technology, and that it is hard enough to get a descent wireless signal from a router in the next room in 2011, is unlikely. But perhaps because it is NASA they have got a really good wireless connection. Or perhaps, the lunar lander and command module had black box recorders which NASA was somehow able to retrieve.
Whilst not a complete waste of the audience’s time it is difficult to understand why no one went back to the moon, especially considering if they simply took a can of bug spray and/or a fly swatter they would probably have made it back to Earth without too much trouble.
2/5
Watchable but only just.
Christopher Sharman - In 2009 I self-published my first novel entitled The Darkness Saga: The Light (currently available at amazon.co.uk) which has been ...
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