![]() Even while we are on his side, agreeing with everything he says, the main thing that interests us is his more-than-passing resemblance to Roman Polanski. Proof of this lack of dramatic engagement is found in our attitude to Robert Waldon, who first notices a problem with the telemetry. There are a lot of frankly anal conversations about readouts between the technicians - conversations which labour the points and go round and round in circles, restating the same arguments without really engaging us. Not only is the plot a conspiracy theorist's wet dream, but whole sections of Capricorn One's dialogue feels like it was written by such theorists. The icing on the cake is the casting of Holbrook having played Deep Throat in All The President's Men, we instinctively know that he's up to no good. The US was still reeling from both Watergate and the back end of the Vietnam War, two events which made blaming or being suspicious of the government both very easy and very popular. The Flat Earth Society went so far as to claim that the landings were shot on a Disney soundstage by Stanley Kubrick, with Neil Armstrong's dialogue being written by Arthur C. Although it was made six years after the last Apollo mission, theories that the Moon landings were faked were still hot currency. The story of Capricorn One is a classic conspiracy theory premise which taps into many big issues in 1970s culture. These discussions precede similar ones included in Apollo 13, although it must be said that Ron Howard's film handles the subject in a way which is more dramatically engaging (in other words, by not having it all come out in big speeches). He remarks that when Apollo 17 landed on the Moon, more people complained about re-runs of I Love Lucy being cancelled than actually watching the landing. Holbrook talks about needing to recapture the imagination of the American public, who have become disengaged and cynical. Capricorn One does have an interesting idea at the heart of it - namely that, in the near future, the US government would fake landing on Mars to maintain public interest in the space programme. Finally, the film picks up with the plane chase, which ends things on a high without quite making us forget our disappointment. ![]() Then there is a long middle section full of boring soap opera dialogue and people wandering around in the desert, akin to the scenes in Antonio Bay before the fog comes in. Like John Carpenter's film it starts very well, with an intriguing and spooky premise Holbrook's briefing of the astronauts is like the campfire scene where John Houseman tells the dark tale of the Elizabeth Dane. Despite the shared presence of Hal Holbrook, Capricorn One is structurally much closer to The Fog than to All The President's Men. Some of them, like All The President's Men, still hold up after more than 30 years others, such as Capricorn One, do not. But although conspiracy theories will always enjoy a certain amount of popularity, there is no guarantee that the films which entertain such theories will stand the test of time. Cold War paranoia, the OPEC crisis and the long-term fallout from Watergate created a heightened public interest in the workings of government and big corporations, which filtered through into a series of classic films. The 1970s were the golden age of the conspiracy thriller. ![]() ![]() Starring Elliott Gould, James Brolin, Sam Waterson, OJ Simpson
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |