Fly Me to the Moon Review: Does Apple's New Film Really Land on the Moon?
Copyright © Apple Studios, These Pictures, Columbia Pictures
Title: Fly Me to the Moon
Director: Greg Berlanti
Release Date: July 12, 2024
While Apple did not do any good with Argylle, this film showed their second chance at their theatrical promotion. Surprisingly, the trailer for this movie showed in a few showings for family movies, like for IF, because of how this is a tame PG-13 movie. Many movies about the Apollo 11 mission, using Netflix's Apollo 10½: A Space Age Childhood as an example, are well liked for their historical accuracy. Does the new Apple film do the same level as good as the Netflix one did? This review will be about Fly Me to the Moon, the new film starring Scarlett Johansson and Channing Tatum! As part of the AMC Screen Unseen program, it was first promoted in the July 1 spot. Additionally, it gained an early access screening on July 5 a week before its official theatrical release on July 12. Albeit being a box office flop for grossing $37 million worldwide, the reviews are mixed, meaning they are not really as bad at the very least, though. Rotten Tomatoes has the Tomatometer at 66% and the Audience Score at 91% all of a sudden. As for the other review sites, the IMDb score is 6.8/10.0 and the scores on Metacritic are a Metascore of 49 and User Score of 6.5. With an Apollo 11 spin on the Meet Cute trope mixed with star-studded casting, Fly Me to the Moon is enjoyable enough to land on the moon!
Summary
During the 1960s Space Race between the United States and the Soviet Union, NASA has a task to fix their mainstream reputation. As a NASA director, Cole Davis (Channing Tatum), and a marketing specialist, Kelly Jones (Scarlett Johansson), develop a relationship, they set up a fake Moon landing in case the actual Moon landing fails.
Reasons
The best to get from Fly Me to the Moon are the fun characters, celebrity acting performances, and the solid production. Starting with the characters first, they make their roles entertaining and comical in a good way, thanks to the cast. The main two leads, Kelly Jones and Cole Davis, are simple but not in a way that makes them bland. What that means is that the writers wanted to make them a cute couple who are each responsible for their jobs respectively. Plus, their chemistry is enough to have someone feel all warm inside. The side characters, like Henry Smalls and Lance Vespertine, are also great and funny, especially the latter for being a self-absorbed comic relief. Speaking of which from earlier, the acting performances were genius. This is mostly going to Scarlett Johansson who pulled off Kelly's energetic personality well. Same would go for Channing Tatum as Cole Davis but not as much as Johansson did. Other than that, all of the cast members did a great job acting in this movie. Even though most of them are not A-list actors, they still deserve the credit. Before moving on to the next paragraph, the production looks clean and pretty for the 1960s setting. The movie's budget was $100 million which gives them advantage to buy a lot of products for the look. A lot of the cinematography is accurate to fit in the era of the story. Sprinkled in-between, there are some archived clips which are a good touch to this being a modern film. More notably, the majority of the costumes are well-designed for that time period.
Alongside, Fly Me to the Moon also endeavors to harbor a charming concept, witty humor, and colorful editing. The concept caused the story to turn out as pleasant as Apple needed it to be. Even though the Meet Cute trope may not be anything new, the storywriters still thought of a good idea to use it with an odd motif. If they could tell this kind of story in a different setting, then others can do the same as long as they do not overuse the tropes to death. Since this is supposed to be a comedy, another highlight of this is how the humor in this movie a sharp-witted element worth noting. It may be difficult to understand at first but once the story is absorbed enough, it becomes easier to get what the movie is joking about. Most of them are one-liners that are situational to the plot. There are also a few tongue-in-cheek jokes that make up the conflict. To top it off for the strengths, the editing is smooth and looks pleasing to the eyes. It looks 60s-based which is fit for what the movie is going for. Plus, this is not shoved in as much because it wants to tell a realistic yet cute story about a real event that happened.
Because it is not necessarily a masterpiece, Fly Me to the Moon has the problems of its formulaic plotline, rushed points, and predictability. The movie wanted to play with the Meet Cute trope by integrating it into its own twist of a real event. However, the story is still obvious and straightforward to the point where it becomes formulaic. Next, the story tends to rush sometimes between minor points in the story. Some of these were missing in Kelly and Cole's chemistry. Despite that they did interact so well, some parts of their relationship have some small gaps to be filled. Finally, even though this is not really a serious issue, the movie can be predictable at times. Thanks to its formulaic plot, it is easy to guess what is going to happen next. Unlike the other two flaws, the movie does not have to worry about this because it is meant to be a simple Apollo 11 story.
Conclusion
As it harbors a fun pack of story and production elements, Fly Me to the Moon proves to be enjoyable enough to successfully land on the moon! First of all, thanks to the actors who were hired for the movie, the characters, plus their acting performances, were notable for being fun and entertaining. For the 1960s era of the movie, the production and editing looked fit for the time period the story wanted to aim for, which is why the $100 budget was put to good use. Even though this is not anything fresh and new, the concept of the Meet Cute trope at the time of the Apollo 11 mission is a simple but also pleasing story, even if it does have its formulaic and rushed problems combined. To finalize, the humor is a highlight for being witty and proper for the situations the characters run into. Even if this may not be an award-deserving masterpiece, Fly Me to the Moon would be a great pick for a comedy movie night, especially when it would be for a date.
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