Opération lune (2002) (TV)

User Rating:

8.0/10   

Director:

William Karel

Release Date:

16 October 2002 (France)

Genre:

Drama | Comedy | Documentary

Plot Keywords:

Moon Landing | Mockumentary | Mock Documentary | Apollo 11

Awards:

1 win & 1 nomination

Cast

Stanley Kubrick	...	Himself (archive footage)
Richard Nixon	...	Himself (archive footage)
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Buzz Aldrin	...	Himself
Loïs Aldrin	...	Herself
Tad Brown	...	David Bowman
Lawrence Eagleburger	...	Himself
Farouk Elbaz	...	Himself
Alexander Haig	...	Himself
Jan Harlan	...	Himself
Richard Helms	...	Himself
Jeffrey Hoffman	...	Himself
Bernard Kirschoff	...	Dimitri Muffley
Henry Kissinger	...	Himself
Christiane Kubrick	...	Herself
Barbara Rogers	...	Eve Kendall
John Rogers	...	Ambrose Chapel
Donald Rumsfeld	...	Himself
Jacquelyn Toman	...	Maria Vargas
Vernon Walters	...	Himself
David Winger	...	Jack Torrance

Also Known As:

Dark Side of the Moon (Australia) (International: English title)

Runtime:

52 min

Country:

France

Language:

French | English

Color:

Color

Company:

Arte France

Trivia:

The origin of the fictitious characters' names: - Jack Torrance - from The Shining (1980) - David Bowman - from 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) - Dimitri Muffley - from Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964) (a combination of the names of the two presidents) - Eve Kendall - from North by Northwest (1959) - Marla Vargas - from The Barefoot Contessa (1954) - Ambrose Chapel - centre of the spies' activity in The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956) - W.A. Koenigsberg - a play on Woody Allen's (W.A.) real name, Allen Stuart Koenigsberg. George Kaplan - from North by Northwest (1959)

Goofs:

Continuity: A retired KGB general is introduced as 'General Vernon Walters - Former CIA Director' - despite the obvious voice-over translation of his comments in Russian.

Movie Connections:

References North by Northwest (1959)

An extremely original documentary

As I began to watch this film, I did not know what it was about.

The further this documentary proceeded however, the further my mouth fell open ! During this documentary, I kept thinking :"Why didn't I know about this? Why hadn't I, a big Kubrick and space-fan, never heard of this before?". I watched it almost the same way I would watch the landing of a flying saucer.

I will not reveal any "plot"-details, but this one thing I can tell : before you watch : try not to know what it is about. Let yourself be carried away and watch it until the very end (and do not forget the end titles!)

Without any doubt 10 out of 10.