Review: Fly Me to the Moon

Director:  Greg Berlanti

Stars:  Scarlett Johansson, Anna Garcia, Channing Tatum

While they may never have shared screen time in the Coen Brothers’ joyous Hail, Caesar!, Scarlett Johansson and Channing Tatum more than make up for that omission here in Greg Berlanti’s surprisingly entertaining flight of fancy back to the heyday of the 1960s space race. Managing to pivot between liberty-taking period drama, caper movie and classy romcom, Fly Me to the Moon feels like a movie flung out of space. It is wildly out of step with the major studio concerns of modern day blockbuster-making; a mid-budget tilt back to a deeply unfashionable era (at the time of writing), one that has snuck so secretly into cinemas that, from the outside, it might credibly seem like a hoax. That’s kind of fitting given it’s hairbrained conceit.

Meet Kelly (Johansson), an ad-woman from Madison Avenue – a lady Don Draper herself with the shady past to match – drafted in by CIA spook Mo Berkus (Woody Harrelson) to re-package NASA’s Apollo 11 hopes for a jaded American public. Her ‘sell, sell, sell’ approach bristles with the earnest dedication of mission commander Cole Davis (Tatum), a lifer in service of his country who finds Kelly’s trivialisation of the mission an affront to his decade-long commitment to placing American men on the moon.

For a good hour Fly Me to the Moon cruises on amiable pomp, flaunting the magic of advertising as the driving arm of American capitalism, with Tatum rolling his eyes good-humouredly for the camera every time Johansson’s Kelly gets one over on him with the brass. It’s heavy with product placement and kinda patriotic in a weirdly materialistic way, but the leads are on their A-game, selling us the chemistry brewing between Cole and Kelly. Berlanti’s vision of the late 1960s is a little rose-tinted, a little halcyon (nearly nobody smokes, and those that do don’t like it; prejudices of race and sex don’t exist) – but it’s all part of the package deal here. Fly Me to the Moon is pure Dad Cinema reconfigured as a genuinely appealing Date Movie.

Johansson – who also produces – puts her all into this performance. While it’s not as substantial as some of her most iconic work, it’s her most diverse and appealing since Marriage Story, and its well within the comfort zone of razzmatazz that Oscar finds so agreeable. Depending on how the next 6 months flesh out I wouldn’t wholly rule out a nomination for this one (not a win though). Tatum, for his part, essentially retools Magic Mike for mission control. Soderbergh was way ahead of the curve with this guy. Berlanti is blessed whenever the two of them share the screen, oozing A-list charisma. The hard sell isn’t necessary.

And then in the background, at shin-height, there’s another feline star sneaking about stealing the limelight. Not a fortnight after Frodo from A Quiet Place: Day One, Fly Me to the Moon offers us another cat capable of taking off with audience’s hearts. Appropriately named Mischief, this movie’s moggie (actually played by three) represents the silliest of additions to this far-fetched yarn, but still helps 2024’s case as a banner year for cat cinema.

The caper aspect enters the equation when Mo corners Kelly to fake the entire moon landing to ensure a win for America in the face of the Soviets. Cornered by her own dark history, Kelly complies, thus setting up both The Lie that powers the dramatic tension of the romcom element, while also swerving Fly Me to the Moon into an arena to contemporary relevance.

We think too often of the so-called ‘post-truth’ era as a modern one invented by Donald Trump and his cronies, where barefaced lies are presented in direct opposition to the facts and the world turns on. Even a cursory look at modern history will remind us all that this isn’t a brand new phenomena. Hell, Nixon’s shadow is cast all over Fly Me to the Moon.

And yet Berlanti’s puff piece feels cannily in conversation with cinema’s role in muddying the waters. Fly Me to the Moon is so obviously a fanciful story. Nowhere does it try to stress that it’s based on actual events. Nor does it play the wink-wink Fargo–esque ‘almost true’ card (overplayed in movies to the point of nausea now, so bonus points for the restraint). But it’s all-too-easy to imagine this glossy excursion being taken for the truth or some version of it by less savvy viewers. It feels unkind to doubt an audience’s ability to see sense. Sadly it comes from experience.

As events spiral out of Kelly’s control, it’s not so dissimilar to the liberties with history Tarantino has been enjoying over the last 15 years. The movies have the power to disseminate a new folklore. The creation of an idealised kind of America at the expense of veracity to the truth, something soon to be confused further by the dissemination of AI and the promise of perfected reality.

Rose Gilroy’s peppy script is the real winner here, spinning a number of plates simultaneously. Still, if you’re after rigorous, soulful, detailed depictions of NASA’s activities in the ’60s then Damien Chazelle’s (still massively underrated) First Man and Al Reinert’s 1989 doc For All Mankind remain the unimpeachable cornerstones of the genre. By its very design Fly Me to the Moon isn’t even in the same orbit. But neither is it especially trying to be. Instead what’s offered here feels throwback. A vaguely screwball piece of Hollywood candyfloss from an almost-forgotten era of good natured capers. One that, in another time, might’ve starred Cary Grant or Shirley MacLaine. A coquettish cupcake of a film. That sugar, that gloss, is immensely enjoyable to see on screen circa 2024. And while by its very nature it’s unlikely to achieve any kind of staying power, in the moment that sentiment (and sentimentality) plays just fine.