Apollo 18 Reviews

I actually thought this was a really cool idea for a found-footage film; but unfortunately the execution isn't as polished as it needs to be and what starts as an intriguing set-up turns into mediocre horror with bad acting

"Apollo 18" is a faux found-footage documentary-style thriller about a secret lunar mission. Claimed to be edited from 84 hours of footage recently uploaded to the Internet on www.lunartruth.com, by whom, it is not stated. By the way I could not be able to open that particular website even after umpteenth attempts.

"Apollo 18" would have viewers believe that this is the true story of how NASA and the Department of Defense sent a secret final manned mission to the moon in 1974 after the lunar program had been officially shut down. What the astronauts found there has been kept under wraps ever since.

The possibility of being stuck on the moon in the wilderness of space i.e. a couple of astronauts stuck in a landing pod anxiously trying to figure out what to do.

Anyway hidden truth or figment of an imagination, the story is gripping, however with some techincal glitches that support the later. Would be on the watch list of space movie lovers

Nothing much to say here, but that it was very anti climatic. There were some good scares here and there but nothing really made you jump. It was defiantly shocking up until the end, when I was left feeling nothing. The acting wasn't strong at all. Just not a reccomendation at all.

"There's something down here! They knew about it!"

Popularised by 1999's The Blair Witch Project, the "found footage" subgenre has to date covered a wide array of areas, including exorcisms, ghosts, monsters, zombies, and more. Apollo 18 blasts the subgenre into outer space, mixing thrills, claustrophobia, conspiracy theories and altered history to generate this rather unique attempt at manufactured realism. The movie is also note-worthy due to how aggressive the "authenticity" claims are; producer Bob Weinstein was quoted as saying "We didn't shoot anything, we found it. Found, baby", and Apollo 18's marketing asserts that it presents "the truth" about why NASA abruptly stopped travelling to the moon. Conspiracy freaks are likely to have a fucking field day with the faux facts presented here, but the film is destined to be polarising for average movie-goers - it may satisfy admirers of found footage pictures, but it probably won't impress many others.

It's a well-noted historical fact that NASA cancelled all moon-bound space missions after Apollo 17, and this has fuelled conspiracy theories for years. Apollo 18 posits the possibility that this may have been part of a huge government cover-up. Claiming to have been edited from 84 hours of raw footage long hidden from the public, the film concerns the secret launch of Apollo 18, which was manned by a trio of astronauts: Ben Anderson (Christie), Nate Walker (Owen), and John Grey (Robbins). With John stationed in orbit, Ben and Nate begin studying the moon's surface and collecting rock samples. However, the pair soon discover that there may be more to the mission than originally thought. After finding an abandoned Russian proton lander and a blooded corpse nearby, Ben and Nate realise that something strange is happening, and that the moon may not be as desolate as initially assumed.

With movie-goers now quite knowledgeable about the found footage gimmick after having been duped by The Blair Witch Project, it's impossible to craft another such flick that will actually fool anyone. Therefore, the success of any found footage film is measured by how believably the material is sold. Thankfully, director Gonzalo López-Gallego for the most part gets it right in this respect. The performances here seem remarkably natural, the sets are completely convincing, and the visual scheme competently sells the gimmick. Apollo 18 looks like it was genuinely shot in space back in the 1970s, with a grainy, dated-looking film aesthetic that's free of Hollywood artifice. Better still, the various visual imperfections work extremely well, with scratches, specks of dirt and camera glitches that feel completely organic and further help to sell the illusion. Patrick Lussier's editing, meanwhile, is equally impressive, with multiple-camera set-ups having been cut to ensure maximum coherency. The final touch is the evocative sound mix which further allows us to believe we're watching genuine footage rather than actors on a set.

Like every found footage movie, Apollo 18 is a slow-burn of a thriller, so one's enjoyment of the picture is very dependant on your liking of the gimmick. If you found Paranormal Activity boring, you're destined to lose patience rapidly, but this reviewer found the material to be intensely watchable (even engrossing) as it subtly raises anxiety and tension levels the more the narrative progresses. It also seems that writers Cory Goodman and Brian Miller conducted a lot of research, as the dialogue is full of credible-sounding technical mumbo-jumbo. But Apollo 18 does stumble in its scripting department, as Ben, Nate and John are given merely a job title and a few family references before being thrown into horrific circumstances. The film does not provide much of a chance for us to truly care about these characters, hence the picture's dramatic stronghold is not as powerful as it should have been. And, of course, it takes until the movie's final act before any sort of powerful extraterrestrial threat kicks in, but the payoff is underwhelming. It feels like the filmmakers could have gone further and designed a more terrifying space-based horror film.

At the end of the day, Apollo 18 is a competent enough effort, with top-notch technical contributions and a cast capable of naturalistic acting. However, it fails to leave a lasting impact due to the forgettable, generic characters and the lingering sense that more could have been done with this bone-chilling premise.

6.1/10

A found-footage horror movie that purports to have been recovered from NASA's secret final moon mission in the early 1970s. If you're a fan of found-footage horror movies, this one is definitely worth seeing. It follows the formula a little too closely, and in the end it's a tad disappointing. But, I must say, this is the only genre of horror movies that pretty much always scares me. It's all about keeping the threat off screen for as long as possible, giving only hints of it until the film nears the end. They rely mostly on boo! moments and loud noises, but it generally works, at least for me. There's a nice sense of dread for quite a while in the film, and, like The Blair Witch Project or Paranormal Activity, I was watching it with my eyes slightly averted from the screen. The ending of this one is pretty silly, and it denies us a final twist that it hints at frequently. Like those previous two movies I mentioned, I'll never watch this again, but I was quite entertained while watching it.
6/10