So, did Stanley Kubrick fake the Moon landing?

Well, that’s the proposition of William Kare’s documentary (mockumentary?) Dark Side of the Moon, which originally aired on French TV channel Arte in 2002 as Opération Lune.

According to Karel’s (fictional?) film, Kubrick was hired to fake the Apollo 11 mission by the U.S. government. The evidence? Well, secret documents alluding to Kubrick’s involvement in the “fraud” were discovered among the director’s papers after his death in March 1999.

Moreover, Kubrick apparently left clues to his involvement into the scam: firstly, his being loaned lenses by NASA to recreate the candle-lit scenes in his film Barry Lyndon—how else could have got hold of these unless NASA owed him a BIG favor?; secondly, Kubrick allegedly made a confession of his involvement in the conspiracy that is contained in his film version of Stephen King’s The Shining.

Adding substance to these alleged facts, Karel wheels out a highly convincing array of contributors: Henry Kissinger, Buzz Aldrin, Jan Harlan, Richard Helms, Vernon Walters (who is claimed to have mysteriously died after filming) and Christiane Kubrick.

It’s a great romp, and for those who are tempted to believe, watch the bloopers reel at the end.
 

 
Via Open Culture

 
History in perspective - the Moon landing as recorded by a teenager.

There’s nothing like teenage diaries for putting momentous historical events in perspective (Banalities and bathos, 31 December). This is my entry for 20 July 1969. “I went to arts centre (by myself!) in yellow cords and blouse. Ian was there but he didn’t speak to me. Got rhyme put in my handbag from someone who’s apparently got a crush on me. It’s Nicholas I think. UGH. Man landed on moon.”
Dinah Hall
Lustleigh, Devon

From the Guardian Letters’ page.
 
With thanks to Sarah Pinborough
 

 
It was the summer holidays and we were visiting my grandparents. It was warm and giddy, and there was a rippling excitement at the thought of a man landing on the Moon.

No one actually doubted it, but then, no one was really sure it would happen. All we knew was that somewhere above our heads a rocket was hurtling its crew towards their fateful destination.

It was to be shown live on TV. The time difference meant it that the landing was set for the wee small hours of our morning. That night we bought cones from the ice cream man, who still claimed the Moon was made of cheese and the mice would see these astronauts off. He meant well, but I was 7, and didn’t believe him.

Later, sleepily awake, we sat huddled on the sofa, a flickering black and white picture, that suddenly burst with the pock-marked surface of the Moon. It was unbelievable. It was fantastic. And as the Lunar Module Eagle landed, I wondered how this would change our lives? For it seemed to me then that we had gone in search of dreams and had only discovered a rock.

But I was wrong. This was only the beginning. 

As the first man on the Moon, Neil Armstrong was a hero. More, his actions had a greater significance: they cut away the hold of superstition and ignorance from controlling our destiny.

The Moon landing changed this, and we were at last able to begin our examination of the Universe.

R.I.P. Neil Alden Armstrong 1930-2012
 

 
Via Spacecraft Films