Review: ‘Operation Avalanche’ is a peppy mockumentary guide to faking an Apollo moon landing

A breakneck homage to cinematic fakery, filmmaker Matt Johnson’s “Operation Avalanche” repeatedly folds illusion, truth, and alternative history in on itself to a pleasurably absurd degree — a pseudo-documentary that uses “Zelig”-like composite work and a mix of film stock and digitally treated footage to tell the story of a nonexistent 1960s government program to produce a fraudulent moon landing using genuine effects technology. It’s as dizzying as it sounds, but more the fun-house version of disorienting.

As if to add one extra layer of meta to this wink-wink sandwich, Johnson plays himself, as does his costar Owen Williams. (They did this on their last collaboration, the mock doc “The Dirties.”) Here, they’re go-getter Ivy Leaguers who join the CIA and get embroiled in the agency’s determination to find a Soviet mole in NASA who could undermine the Apollo mission. Using the cover of a Maysles-like documentary crew making a movie about the space program — which Johnson really did to get some of their NASA footage — Matt and Owen learn of a more worrisome secret: getting to the moon isn’t the problem, it’s landing and coming back.

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The trailer for “Operation Avalanche.”

Matt’s big idea is to shoot an ersatz landing for broadcast, complete with rigorously researched flooring, atmospheric verisimilitude, and thanks to a clandestinely recorded visit to the “2001: A Space Odyssey” set in England, camera tricks. As Matt excitedly postulates — and I’m paraphrasing, but it’s close — if Stanley Kubrick can use NASA to help render real space, why can’t they use Kubrick’s manufactured space to make their space movie more real? (On a side note, after the unfunny “Moonwalkers,” 2016’s other larkish attempt to build a movie around Kubrick’s rumored involvement in a sham Apollo landing, Johnson’s gag is cannier and more enjoyable. And it comes with a nifty tutorial in Kubrick’s use of front projection to boot.)

The re-creation of the ’60s, and the grainy, zoom-rich camerawork of the era’s direct cinema, are consistent highlights. But if one were to quibble, it’d be over aural details that so thorough a filmmaking team invested in period/regional visual flavor should have noticed and rectified: accents that suggest maybe Canada had a few moles in the CIA, and improvised dialogue that sounds 21^st century (“That’s insane!”). In fact, the unscripted nature of the often repetitive exchanges is too often a drawback, leading to shallow characterizations for anybody who isn’t the passionate, reckless but committed illusionist Johnson plays. (His co-screenwriter Josh Boles also appears, as, yes, someone named Josh Boles.)

Then again, the incorporative style — not story or performance — is the star, and the pace is such that Johnson doesn’t let any analytical wandering during a scene last too long, especially if it has to do with what we’re looking at. It certainly appears as if a few glimpses inside NASA is real historical footage, but maybe not?

Elsewhere, that’s definitely Johnson appearing “Forrest Gump”-style in archival clips of the actual mission control room, as well as asking for an autograph from an unmistakably slouchy, bearded, very real Kubrick. “Operation Avalanche” is also remarkable for proving there’s life yet in the found-footage genre after subpar horror movies ran the gimmick into the ground. It’s still a hard sell for an entire feature. But even if you allow yourself to wonder why a cameraperson in a speeding car’s backseat wouldn’t duck when shots were being fired at it, the POV thrill of it all is still exciting.

That chase comes at a time when the movie’s most paranoiac strain emerges, and our inventive hero Matt begins to get a giant lump about the implications of his “giant leap.” It’s a twinge that adds a nice thematic echo to all the festive jiggery pokery. Because while the movie balances a spirited celebration of America’s space race ingenuity with a satire about the cleverness of mass deceit, it’s hard to ignore the one thing “Operation Avalanche” understands implicitly: whether you’re a believer or a skeptic, a well-crafted image can sell anything.

“Operation Avalanche”

Rated R for language including a brief sexual reference

1 hour, 33 minutes

Playing at the NuArt

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