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NASA Just Wants to Make Sure You Know That 'Apollo 18' Is Not Real

by Ethan Anderton
September 2, 2011
Source: LA Times

With no advance press screenings and a last minute trailer released earlier this week, it's no surprise that Apollo 18 is sitting sloppily with a 40% on Rotten Tomatoes at the time of this writing. But before you see the flick yourself this weekend, the folks from NASA just want to make sure that you don't buy the faux reality of the film purporting to be comprised of real found footage from a classified mission to the moon that supposedly took place in 1972. Bert Ulrich, NASA's liaison for multimedia, film and TV collaborations says, "Apollo 18 is not a documentary. The film is a work of fiction, and we always knew that." Read on!

Ulrich goes on and attempts to distance himself and the program from the film (something viewers may do if the negative reviews keep pouring in) as he told the LA Times, "We were minimally involved with this picture. We never even saw a rough cut. The idea of portraying the Apollo 18 mission as authentic is simply a marketing ploy. Perhaps a bit of a Blair Witch Project strategy to generate hype." With no rockets to launch, I'm glad NASA has the time to debunk this film as pure fiction. But frankly, since they didn't speak out about Michael Bay's Transformers: Dark of the Moon, maybe that means there are robots in disguise hidden beneath our satellite's surface? NASA better start sifting through all the sci-fi films of the past to let me know what's fake and real, otherwise, I'll be absolutely lost.

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Reader Feedback - 23 Comments

Umm... why? Of course it's fake you tards!

Cruzer on Sep 2, 2011

Just saw the movie. Not much of a fan of horror but decided to watch anyway. Apollo 13 the movie was a lot scarier..and it WAS REAL!!!

wallis9 on Jan 14, 2012

Just wondering why, if they would comment on it AT ALL, NASA would wait till the day of release (pushed back from earlier this year)? I'm not even sure a NASA okey-dokey or not would help or hinder this, I'm still interested in seeing it, just like I did BWP, knowing full well it is not real but wanting to enjoy it anyway 🙂

Fredrick Beondo on Sep 2, 2011

Well....I dunno. But you know, all one would have to do is a bit of research to find out that this isn't real. Of course it isn't, even if it does bring up a couple of things (there really was a Russian program to land a man on the moon, but after the failure of the N-1 rocket it was scrapped). But hey, some people say that we've never been to the moon. Maybe they watched CAPRICORN ONE too many times?

Anonymous on Sep 3, 2011

*CONSPIRACY*

DAVIDPD on Sep 2, 2011

I wonder if E.T. is real?

spyder on Sep 2, 2011

Geez, what about Paranormal Activity? Straw Dogs (not found footage but "based on true story") and hundreds of other films. Will say, problem with Transformers 3...Ethan...of course...is that it never said it was found footage so I think it's in the clear. Oh, that was sarcasm you say? lol

Nate Carroll on Sep 2, 2011

But surely NASA have never been to the moon?

Crapola on Sep 2, 2011

wait.. what ? This is not real ?

Tester on Sep 2, 2011

Not defending the movie (haven't even seen it), but "sitting sloppily on 40% on Rotten Tomatoes" means next to nothing. I wish Firstshowing would ditch mentioning them. Rotten Tomatoes is the most rotten, inconsistent film rating website on the Internet, with its oversimplistic aggregation system. Even it's own Wikipedia entry cites the flaws. And you only need to see the long list of films it has rated "100%" (aka absolutely flawless?) over the years, to realize what a waste of time it is.

Anonymous on Sep 2, 2011

I do not give a damn about RT myself. Why do so many people rely on them?

Anonymous on Sep 3, 2011

My first reaction to the head line was "Oh, rly?" I came here to see how everyone else would react to that headline. Yeah, even with movies "based on a true story" much of the time it's only loosely based on that story with a lot of creative liberties and dramatization so those aren't "real" either. I would say the only "real" films are certain documentaries that use actual footage of real life in them and even then after editing they may take things out of context and change the meaning.

Smoke Tetsu on Sep 3, 2011

I wish NASA hadn't made the announcement. Thinking this movie was real would be a litmus test for stupidity.

Craig on Sep 3, 2011

Ohwow, well played, marketing boys of Apollo 18! They got NASA to come with a statement on this movie, huh! 😉

David Banner on Sep 3, 2011

Come on, United states people are in general bigots and NASA don't want to have a strange and bad image over the masses and the majority of U.S. people. That's why they said it's not true.

Zeroman on Sep 3, 2011

At face value, it would seem odd- but folks, I don't think there's anything wrong with NASA making a statement to say 'Apollo 18' is nothing more than fiction. In this day and age you have a lot of mis-information and urban legend on the internet- there are going to be a (hopefully small) handful of people who think there might be something to it.

DarrenJSeeley on Sep 4, 2011

Ehh that's not fair. Transformers never claimed to be real. With the style of the filmmaking and the ads blatantly saying THIS IS REAL I can't blame them for making sure the idiots out there don't start spreading rumors.

Happy on Sep 4, 2011

But I guess that NASA did this because they want not to alienate all the future generation, (now young) of scientists engineer pilots that could a day replace the actual astronatus and Earth scientists. For "adults" it actually doesn't works as a deterrent but as an attractor to science instead. ... It's not about bigotry.

Zeroman on Sep 5, 2011

i think you are all gay biatches arguing about shit that didnt happen as if rocks turn into alien life and kill ppl why didnt it happen to apollo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 bullshit

David Davies69 on Nov 19, 2011

Well maybe people wouldn't think it was based on actual footage if they wouldn't have said it was. In the movie it says it's based on actual footage they found. It's quite obvious that it's fake but maybe they should be a bit clearer ?

Purplefreak01 on Dec 28, 2011

Even if its real, government WILL DEFINETLY DENY the story. Well, its just the way of the world right now. Everything that will shake humanity, they will cover it, or if its already came out (as an issue), THEY WILL DENY IT. Well, suck it up, cause thats the Government's way, there's nothing we can do!!!

suckitup on Jan 2, 2012

no no if it was fake or real they would deny it

Johnjohnmartmart on Jan 9, 2012

at the end of the movie they show you a austernot alone in the rocket who is holding the camera

John Martin on Jan 9, 2012

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