10 Movie Conspiracy Theories You Won't Believe Exist

10. Kubrick Faked The Moon Landing …

There’s many a conspiracy theory surrounding the life and works of director Stanley Kubrick, but one of the most pervasive is that he helped NASA fake the 1969 Apollo 11 Moon landing. Legend has it that Kubrick’s epic sci-fi 2001: A Space Odyssey was actually a cover for a research and development project instigated by NASA so that the director could practice creating convincingly accurate space scenes for the faked landing footage.

Why was it necessary to fake the Moon landing, I hear you cry? Well, during the Space Race between the USA and Soviet Union the Russians were inching ahead of the Yanks having already successfully landed an unmanned spacecraft on the surface of the Moon in 1959 and sent the first man into space, Yuri Gagarin, less than two years later. America was losing face and needed to get a man to the Moon first, but that was a risky and expensive endeavour. Luckily, the USA had something that the Russians didn’t – a glittering film industry and the talents of a certain Stanley Kubrick.

Evidence to support the wacky theory comes courtesy of filmmaker and conspiracy hunter Jay Weidner who points out the similarities between 2001: A Space Odyssey and NASA’s Moon landing footage in his documentary series Kubrick’s Odyssey. Kubrick was a pioneer of a visual effect known as front screen projection which was used in some of 2001’s most iconic moments, including the opening ‘Dawn of Man’ sequence and in space walk scenes. Apparently, the likeness between such scenes and NASA’s lunar footage is too great to be coincidental.

That’s quite a stretch of the imagination as it is, but the Kubrick theories don’t end there.

---