‘Fly Me to the Moon’ trailer mixes real-life Apollo history with moon landing hoax

In case you are even an informal area historical past fanatic, watching the brand new trailer for the upcoming film “Fly Me to the Moon” would possibly go away you pondering that it’s a whole work of fiction.

And for essentially the most half, you’ll be appropriate.

Because the trailer reveals and Columbia Photos and Apple Unique Movies’ synopsis reads, “Fly Me to the Moon” is a “comedy-drama set towards the high-stakes backdrop of NASA’s historic Apollo 11 moon touchdown.” Scarlett Johansson performs the fictional Kelly Jones, a advertising and marketing maven who’s introduced in to repair NASA’s public picture, and within the course of, “wreaks havoc” on the duty set forth for launch director Cole Davis (Channing Tatum).

“I work right here now, to promote the moon,” says Jones (Johansson), explaining why she is at NASA to Davis (Tatum) within the trailer.

Within the 2-minute and 30-second video, Jones is proven organizing industrial product placements for the Apollo astronauts to endorse and, when she can’t get NASA’s group of engineers to do interviews, replaces them with actors. All of which ends up in the movie’s crux, “Mission Artemis” (to not be confused with NASA’s Artemis program, which seeks to return astronauts to the moon right now, 50 years after the Apollo program ended).

“The entire world will probably be watching, we won’t afford to lose to the Russians. We have to shoot a backup model,” says Woody Harrelson, as a but to be recognized NASA official.

In different phrases, they should faux the moon touchdown.

Whereas that will sound like fodder for conspiracy theorists, it does have a kernel of reality to it, although not in the way in which the movie appears to point out.

Because the trailer wraps up, Johansson is proven recruiting a director (Jim Rash) and setting about recreating the lunar floor on a sound stage.

“Should you faux this mission,” warns Davis (Tatum), “each single factor that now we have sacrificed could have been for nothing!”

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Suffice to say, NASA in actual life didn’t movie a backup or faux the moon landings. However the tv networks like CBS and NBC did, utilizing puppets and stand-ins (together with take a look at pilots from Grumman [today, Northrop Grumman], the corporate that constructed the lunar lander) to fill in visuals when reside video was not obtainable.

As for product placements, whereas NASA didn’t pay for firms to advertise the Apollo program, producers whose gadgets had been utilized by the astronauts had been fast to see the attraction of promoting that reality to the general public.

Primarily based on the trailer, “Fly Me to the Moon” contains a mixture of actual life and made up endorsements. Omega, to today, hinges a part of its advertising and marketing to the truth that it made the primary watch worn on the moon. And Snoopy, who may be noticed on a poster in one of many trailer’s scenes, has had a very long time function as NASA’s security mascot by way of an settlement with Charles M. Schulz and Peanuts Worldwide.

Primarily based on the trailer, the filmmakers went to some extent to match the look of the period, sourcing props and costumes that match the actual {hardware} that was used for the Apollo missions (the spacesuits, for instance, had been made by skilled duplicate artist Ryan Nagata, who beforehand offered clothes for the Neil Armstrong bio pic “First Man”). There are some diversions from actuality, although, together with a scene exhibiting the horizontal integration of a Saturn V rocket and a Saturn IB standing atop a cell launch platform with a umbilical tower (such a configuration was not used till the Skylab program).

Among the film’s scenes had been shot on location, with NASA granting permission for the manufacturing to movie at Kennedy House Heart in Florida in March 2023.

And, whereas the movie makes use of fictional names for its leads, there are actors portraying actual individuals, together with the ill-fated Apollo 1 crew and the Apollo 11 astronauts.

Jones’ (Johansson) place at NASA can also be not fully fictional. The company did make a concerted effort and was largely profitable in advertising and marketing the moon by way of the work of a group of public relations specialists. Extra than simply offering mission commentary, the members of NASA’s public affairs workplaces churned out pamphlets, press kits, bylined articles and ready-to-air radio and tv options.

“You understand you could not make it to today with out me,” says Jones (Johansson) within the trailer, stressing the function advertising and marketing had in making the moon landings occur.

“Fly Me to the Moon,” which opens in theaters on July 12, was directed by Greg Berlanti, based mostly on a screenplay by Rose Gilroy and a narrative by Invoice Kirstein and Keenan Flynn. Along with Johansson, Tatum, Harrelson and Rash, the solid contains Nick Dillenburg, Anna Garcia, Noah Robbins, Colin Woodell, Christian Zuber, Donald Elise Watkins and Ray Romano.