Review of Apollo 18 (2011) by Jesse O — 20 Jun 2015

A movie that honestly just came and went without really making much of an impression other than its badness. I'd like to think that there was a good idea here on paper and it just didn't pan out.

It might not necessarily be the best idea I've ever seen, but there's definitely some potential here with the whole manned mission to the moon that you were never supposed to know about. They waste that with a generic, bland and, quite frankly, terrible movie.

I honestly spent time trying to think of better movies that you could probably make in space. Clowns on the Moon, for example, was one that I came up with that I was the most satisfied with. I don't mean to say that I could make a better film, it's that I can imagine better films being made with a somewhat similar concept.

And, of course, the found footage was completely unnecessary and unbelievable, even in the context that the film is presented. I get why it was done, it's cheaper that way, but I just don't buy it in this context.

It's also very poorly used to be perfectly honest, might be some of the worst usage of the concept I've seen in any of these type of films. There are worse films, overall, than this. But the usage of the camera style was absolutely terrible.

I think it was just done to get the Paranormal Activity crowd. It's definitely an easy movie to watch, it's only like 75 minutes long, so it doesn't overstay its welcome. Well I mean it does if you thought the movie was terrible, which I did.

I just mean in the sense that it's not gonna linger past its 'breaking point', so to speak. It ends when it should and not a second longer. Of course, you wish you could get all the time you spent on the film back and use it to do something more productive, but it's a short enough movie and that's one of the few positives it has.

The film does 'look' authentic enough, the setting I mean. Then again, it's probably fairly easy, with a decent enough budget, to make an authentic-looking moon setting. It's definitely not something that's too difficult to pull off.

Particularly if it only takes place in one part of the moon. Either way, this film is pretty bad. It could've been considerably worse, but it doesn't offer anything that's new or worth recommending.

I can't even think of a scenario where this film would be required viewing. Terrible and bland film that, seemingly, no one will like. Watch Europa Report instead. Not exactly a horror movie, but it's similar to this and considerably better as well.