Review of Apollo 18 (2011) by Jesse M — 26 Jan 2012

As a kid I often thought about the real horror of being an astronaut. You're riding on calculations that have to be exact, otherwise you're lost out in the black abyss. Apollo 18, in my opinion, captured the horror of being alone and abandoned like none of us could ever imagine. You're not mere miles from home, there's literally no one around to help you, it's a thought that somewhat disturbs me. Moreover, the bit where Ben has to extract the moon rock/crab creature from Nate, him screaming, "get it out!" made for a nice contrast to the starch, clean scientific environment of their ship, showing that the only form of surgery on board was medieval at best. I found the plot to have the makings of what could be a great story, and thats something I admire and enjoy seeing on screen.

With the found-footage genre becoming more popular, I enjoy seeing new directors experiments with the confines of fixed and low definition cameras, supplying what feels like a real and gritty piece. Apart from Paranormal Activity's plot -which Apollo 18 begs the question of when would it be necessary or part of the story to have these camera's around. It was an interesting. When we take away the now campy "found-footage" genre, we instead see what is really a neorealist horror film, where the shots aren't to be there for cinema value, but rather what tries to be a realistic view point. Still Hollywood makes it's way into the film and with a bit of B-movie magic, the films ultimate flaw is the rock creatures that inhabit the moon. Still, I found the movie to be entertaining in its own sick-disturbing way and I was okay with putting the rock-monsters aside in my head and simply be entertained by the real horror which was the setting. Instead of the suspense of maybe a James Bond movie where you ask yourself "how's he going to get himself out of this one?" I found myself asking "what's going to go wrong next?".