I just watched it on a Belgian tv station. I wonder of anyone else here's seen it too, but chances of that are probably slim. Anyway, I know I should probably post this on the lunar conspiracies forum, but not only did it seem that part of the board was turned into a forum for all kinds of conspiracy theories wherein this post would likely be drowned out, but it also appears to me that most of the frequent visitors of this site are concentrated here in the general section. In the end the documentary (and my post as well) is about quite a few more things than just the moon hoax itself, so I thought it fitting to write about it here. I suppose if the BA doesn't find it appropriate for this post to be in this place after all it can always be moved [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_wink.gif[/img]

First off, I've to say this was one of the strangest documentaries I've ever seen. It was done by a frenchman, and it was quite recent (from last year I believe). What was strange about it was not only that the general content was completely off the wall, but that they apparently managed to interview people like Donald Rumsfeld, Henry Kissinger and other well-known people for it. As I said in the few lines above, the documentary was about much more than just the lunar conspiracy theory, but what really confused me was that it was at times hard to tell whether the makers were actually being serious or not. The program lasted about an hour, the first fifteen or twenty minutes of which were pretty alright; after that they delved into the actual moon hoax (though only for a surprisingly short time, and not too in-depth), and after that it became just plain...well, loony (pun intended? [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_wink.gif[/img] ). I find myself having some trouble to pick a place to start, so I guess I would do best to just take you through the documentary itself the way I saw it:

The program opens with the narrator talking about Stanley Kubrick and his search at one point for a type of lense that would allow him to shoot scenes in a certain way. They go into detail about what the lense was supposed to be able to do and about Stan Kubrick himself, but I'll leave it out as it's not really relevant; the main point was that Kubrick finally found what he was looking for with NASA, in the form of a special type of lense that was used by them. The narrator mentions at this point that the equipment in question was/is pretty exclusive, and that it was strange that NASA loaned it to him just like that. The first person they interview then is Stanley Kubrick's wife; she talks about how she found documents belonging to her husband when rummaging through his stuff after his death. One of the documents was from the White House and had 'Top Secret' on it; apparently it had something to do with those lenses he asked for. Pay attention, because this will resurface way at the end.

The narrator then goes on to talk about 2001, and how great an impression it made on certain people at NASA when they saw the first few scenes that were shot. At this point they show a number of NASA employees expressing their feelings toward the movie. The documentary then focuses on the space race between the US and Russia, and the race to the moon both countries were involved in; the public in the United States needed to become interested in this subject, so eventually NASA turned to Hollywood, knowing that filmmakers would be able to give space travel and -research the necessary 'zing'. Several people who were involved in the movie industry back then are interviewed (though personally I didn't know them), saying that NASA worked actively with filmmakers to liven up their image. What's strange at this point, though, is that the documentary (and the filmmakers they interviewed) claims several things that seem like complete hogwash to me, like the fact that those gold and silvery foils you see on spacecraft are one of the things that were added by recommendation of the "hundreds of Hollywood technicians" that overran the NASA space center at that time, to make the spacecraft look more expensive. That's just one example of where the show started to become a little weird.

Moving on though, we suddenly see a meeting between the people who were part of Nixon's staff during the years he was president; the cameramen are in a room with Rumsfeld, Kissinger, the head of the CIA during the Nixon years, and one or two more people from his administration. What the documentary becomes here is what I, after watching it in full, must believe is a clever game of editing and writing (as was most of the program, I'm now inclined to think); the narrator talks about how Nixon was told that it might not be possible to actually get footage or pictures from the moon when the astronauts finally land there, and that Nixon would not stand for it and desperately wanted man's first steps on the moon to be shown no matter what. Thus, it's said, Nixon contacted Stanley Kubrick, who he knew was working miracles in special effects with his 2001 project that was still in the works. The CIA demanded access to the studio Kubrick was using at the time and wanted him to direct the necessary scenes of astronauts bouncing around on the moon. Kubrick first refused, but later did the scenes anyway.

Now, all through these segments of the documentary, from Nixon wanting 'backup scenes' to be shot all the way to the parts about Kubrick filming them, the makers show Rumsfeld, Kissinger and the others apparently replying to questions they were asked about these matters. The thing is though that none of their responses had anything specific in them about the subject, and occasionally seemed a little 'off', in the sense that it seemed to me that they were asked questions about entirely different matters. It seems ludicrous to me in the first place that they would answer these questions with such enthusiasm as they do in the program, that they would sit there like old friends readily admitting to what would be one of the greatest scandals in history. At this point, though, the show has not literally claimed that man did not go the moon; they leave that to a 'former KGB operative' who defected to the United States, a man whose English sounds suspiciously like that of a native American.

What this individual dredges up during the next few minutes are only some of the old arguments that HBs use to 'prove' that man did not land on the moon; first he talks about the waving flag, then about the diverging shadows, then about the extreme temperatures that would make survival impossible and would melt or freeze cameras, etc. I don't think I need to go over this easily debunk-able drivel on this forum, but what was definitely something new to me were some of the pictures they showed; one was of an astronaut standing in a lunar landscape that had two spotlights above it, and another was actually (you'll never guess this) of a photograph of Stan Kubrick lying in the lunar dust(!). Supposedly these pictures were from never-developed films from the moonlanding, and they were used as proof that they were actually shot in Kubrick's studio.

This was about halfway through the program, where things really started to get weird. I can be fairly short about the rest though and just give you a short summary of what it was about; first of all, more footage of Rumsfeld and others commenting on what I truly believe were entirely different matters, accompanied by a narrator who talks about the disappearance of the members of the film team that worked on the fake moonlanding movie. According to the narration they fled to remote places all over the world and were tracked down by order of Nixon; supposedly he sent 150.000 (no, this is not a typo) men after four guys that fled to Korea. The documentary shows several Koreans being interviewed in a village in the jungle, supposedly the place where those four men hid out, but at this point it seemed to me like the makers weren't even trying to be clever anymore in their deception as it was quite clear to me the natives they showed on camera simply talked about the war. Generally the comments were of the sort 'they left coke bottles everywhere'; there was nothing even remotely specific about the things the narrator was talking about in those responses. The program manages to get even stranger, however, when several men are interviewed who actually worked on the fake moonlanding tape; their faces and voices aren't scrambled though, and their names are shown at the bottom of the screen. One is even a vicar and is just sitting there in his own church, answering the questions.
But the absolute highlights of the documentary come at the very end, when they show what is supposed to be a tape made by the CIA as they assassinate a member of Kubrick's team that fled all the way to Greenland. Here it's painfully obvious that what is actually shown is simply part of a nature video; a helicopter lands on the ice, penguins are shown walking around, and a man with a rifle on his back walks a few paces, takes the weapon off his back and fires. The funny part is that he's clearly aiming down, most likely to hit one of the penguins with a tranquilizer dart or something similar. After that, the program claims Stan Kubrick never left his home anymore after shooting 2001 because he was afraid the CIA would get him too, and that he shot all his subsequent movies in a location near his house. Another poor edit is when they show Mrs Kubrick talking about what the viewers are expected to believe are Kubrick's fears over the secret agents coming to get him, while I am very sure she's actually talking about Full Metal Jacket at that point, especially where she says Stan 'would try to imagine what it would be like to have all those soldiers coming into the building'.

The documentary's 'smoking gun' however is saved for last; during the program there were occasionally shown clips of them talking to a recently deceased french politician about such subjects as the space race, Nixon, etc, and at the end it is claimed that his death (by stroke) came just one day after the interview they did with him, and that he had agreed to meet with them again the next day and tell them 'all that they wanted to know, off-camera'. To prove this they showed a newspaper article from the New York Times (if I'm not mistaken) wherein the death of the politician was mentioned, an article mentioning that the last people he spoke to were a french film crew.

This is where the 'documentary' (finally) ended, but not before referring to the lense Kubrick was allowed to borrow from NASA one more time; the final conclusion the narrator makes, as you might already have guessed, is that NASA must have given him the equipment he needed because they were afraid he would expose the whole deal. After that the credits rolled across the screen, wherein suddenly I saw that they had actually used actors to portray just about everybody apart from the more well-known people mentioned, like Mrs Kubrick, Kissinger, and so on. All in all I can say I was _gravely_ disappointed in the network that showed the program, as it's generally a pretty respectable station that shows loads of good documentaries, music shows and films. Worst of all, I actually expected (by the way the program was announced and also because I already knew it had something to do with Stanley Kubrick) that this was going to be something classy and was out to debunk the moon hoax or at least to give a somewhat objective view. Instead it left me staring dazed at my tv screen wondering whether this was perhaps some bizarre parody on conspiracy theories.
Anyhoo, I just wanted to take some time out and type this up, and I hope you enjoy reading it so you can look out for the program when it's broadcast in your area (which I guess it will, in time, if it hasn't been already). My only regret is that I didn't take notes, as I was planning to do, or at least tape the show so I could watch it again. I'd be interested to know what you think about it at least, especially about some of the stuff that I can only imagine must be new additions to the moon hoax lore, like the whole Kubrick-thing. My apologies finally for any spelling mistakes, typos or perhaps some incoherence; this is a long post and I tried to write fast and didn't re-read too thoroughly.

Wow! Great post.

I am envious that you got to see that drivel. I want to see it too. Do you know the name of the program? Who was the Director?

My favorite part in your description was the obvious nature footage being shown off as a execution.

My question is: If they really were executing someone, why take a camera crew along? Well at least they took the time to get some nice shots of penguins.

The only problem with the Pengins is that they live in the south pole, not greenland. [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_lol.gif[/img]

Also 150,000! So they (the Govt.) could not keep a cast of say, 200 or so people quiet, they tey could controll 150,000. Yah right.


<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: g99 on 2003-03-04 22:24 ]</font>

Um, if it's the same one as this one, it's a parody.

http://fpmail.friends-partners.org/p...er/005996.html
Was that the video you saw? If so, it's a joke.

And never mind that the moon's surface in 2001 and the real lunar surface look nothing alike.

If you find the name of this show you should post it here.

It's actually a parody? My goodness, that would at least explain a few things, especially the general weirdness of the later half of the show. I just looked up the name of the documentary and found that it's called 'Opération Lune', or 'Dark Side of the Moon' in english. It says here the guy who made it was William Karel.

Strange that the message you posted here mentions that there were clear remarks after the broadcast that it's not a true documentary; the network that showed the program here didn't say anything about that at all and had advertised it as a serious documentary about the moon hoax. Worse even; it was actually broadcast in a show called "doc.story", a serious program that broadcasts foreign documentaries on a wide range of topical issues like politics, medical science, and so on. Even the tv guide mentioned something about it and apparently took it seriously. Well, if it truly is a parody then I'm at least relieved that the things that were put forth in the show aren't meant for real. However (and this is a fairly big however in my opinion), I am now all the more disappointed in the network for passing this off as an actual documentary and so allowing people to take it at face-value. I at least feel fairly silly now that it seems I've wasted my frustration on something at which my anger should not have been directed, and though feeling silly once in a while is maybe not entirely unhealthy I do think it's deplorable that many people who saw the program will probably have become HBs. I'd also like to put forth the question then whether we really need a parody-documentary on the moon hoax at this time, especially one that's not clearly a parody but which looks and feels pretty serious; after all, the lunar conspiracy -thing is only just lifting off (another pun? [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_wink.gif[/img] ) in most of the world, and I definitely feel people should first be properly informed before shows like this are put out there in an attempt to confuse what's already a pretty vague issue for most. They could at least have put some kind of disclaimer at the very end, or perhaps shown a link to badastronomy.com there [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_wink.gif[/img]

We talked about this movie here
http://www.badastronomy.com/phpBB/vi...c=2460&forum=3

Harald

Great Post
It sounds like a funny show. I gotta find it and watch it one day with someone who knows nothing about the topic and see if they believe in it. That would be very entertaining

Thanks for the really thorough rundown, ASODE. That's a lot of writing to go through. The show sounds hilarious.

You know, if I wanted to film a moon hoax, the last thing I'd want is a hollywood director. These guys are creative types. They want drama, not boring realism. I don't doubt the one I get would want to include car chases and some kind of love affair. [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_smile.gif[/img]

__________________
...And that, my liege, is how we know the Earth to be banana-shaped. --Sir Bedevere

Many people considered Kubrick's "2001" pretty boring. Nearly no dialogue, no characters, no action, no plot.

That's not my opinion.

Harald

I've met people who share that opinion, but I love "2001". I find it a tense, suspenseful drama. But then again, I like watching "Earth Views" on NASA TV, so I may be a tiny bit more tolerant of long stretches of footage with very little going on. [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_razz.gif[/img]