As part of a top-secret mission, a trio of astronauts named Anderson, Walker, and Grey are sent to the moon. Apparently, this is a world in which NASA can shoot people into space and nobody will notice the giant flame-spewing rocket taking off from the Kennedy Space Center. Apollo 18 is carrying some motion-sensitive camera equipment to set up some kind of eye-in-the-sky to watch the surface of the moon and keep an eye on the pesky Soviets. (Apparently, his move takes place in the mid-70s, but there’s absolutely nothing about the movie that makes use of this context, aside from a few mentions of the Russians.) The major selling point of Apollo 18 is the fact that it is constructed in found footage format, compiled into movie form by a nebulous person for ambivalent intent. How they got this footage is not explained, and I guess it really doesn’t matter. The movie is book-ended by interviews with the ‘real’ astronauts and closed with what is essentially the Animal House ending in which we see pictures and are told what happened to them. Indeed, the three actors in the film (Warren Christie, Lloyd Owen, and Ryan Robbins) aren’t even credited to their various characters on the IMDb. Apparently, Dimension chief Bob Weinstein himself has called the film found footage, even though NASA has officially declared it all hype and refused to cooperate with the filming. The whole point of a found footage movie is so that you can sell it like it is real – that’s what made Blair Witch a phenomenon and what made The Fourth Kind mildly interesting from a conceptual standpoint. Apollo 18 could have been an awesome movie; instead, it settles for mildly entertaining with an interesting ending. It’s almost like a Tarantino-style movie loaf that borrows elements from other movies and uses them as shorthand. Apollo 18 drops references to Apollo 13, Blair Witch, Paranormal Activity, Alien, Solaris, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Mission to Mars, Moon, and a particularly good episode of The Outer Limits called The Sandkings. One good thing you can say about this movie, from a style standpoint, is that it doesn’t use a lot of shaky camerawork in lieu of building tension. Miller and Lopez-Gallego just choose not to bother with throwing any psychological weight behind their movie. I’m sure they tried, but we’re not given any reason to care about Anderson or Walker. However, it’s not all bad. The alien menace is interesting from a zoological standpoint, and unlike Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark, they’re not overexposed. The references can be fun if you like playing Movie Bingo, and at a crisp 88 minutes, it doesn’t overstay its welcome. However, once it’s over, it’s fairly forgettable. US correspondent Ron Hogan has nothing witty to say about this movie. Sorry, gang. Find more by Ron at his blog, Subtle Bluntness, and daily at Shaktronics and PopFi.