5/12/2022 Capricorn One - Wikipedia

Capricorn One
Capricorn One is a 1978 British-produced American thriller
film in which a reporter discovers that a supposed Mars Capricorn One
landing by a crewed mission to the planet has been faked via a
conspiracy involving the government and—under duress—the
crew themselves. It was written and directed by Peter Hyams
and produced by Lew Grade's ITC Entertainment. It stars
Elliott Gould as the reporter, and James Brolin, Sam
Waterston, and O. J. Simpson as the astronauts. Hal Holbrook
plays a senior NASA official who goes along with
governmental and corporate interests and helps to fake the
mission.

The music score was created by Jerry Goldsmith.

Contents
Plot
Cast
Production Theatrical release poster
Development Directed by Peter Hyams
Shooting Written by Peter Hyams
Release Produced by Paul N. Lazarus
Reception III

Other media Starring Elliott Gould

See also James Brolin

References Brenda Vaccaro

Sources Sam Waterston

External links O. J. Simpson

Hal Holbrook
David
Plot Huddleston
David Doyle
Capricorn One—the first crewed mission to Mars—is on the
launch pad. Just before liftoff, astronauts Charles Brubaker, Karen Black
Peter Willis, and John Walker are suddenly removed from the Telly Savalas
spacecraft. Bewildered, they are flown to an abandoned
Cinematography Bill Butler
military base in the desert. The launch proceeds on schedule,
with the public unaware the spacecraft is empty. Edited by James Mitchell
Music by Jerry Goldsmith
At the base, NASA official Kelloway informs the astronauts
that a faulty life-support system would have killed them in- Production ITC
company Entertainment
flight. He says they must help counterfeit the televised footage
during the flight to and from Mars. Another failed space Distributed by Warner Bros.

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mission would result in NASA's funding being cut and private Release date June 2, 1978
contractors losing millions in profits. Kelloway threatens their
Running time 124 minutes
families to force their cooperation.
Country United States
The astronauts remain captive during the flight and appear to Language English
be filmed after landing on Mars, although they are actually
inside of a makeshift TV studio at the base. At the command Budget $5 million
center, only a few officials know about the conspiracy until an (estimated)
alert technician, Elliot Whitter, notices that ground control Box office $12 million (US
receives the crew's televised transmissions before the and Canada
spacecraft telemetry arrives. Whitter reports this to his rental)[1]
supervisors, including Kelloway, but is told it is due to a faulty
workstation. Whitter partially shares his concerns with a TV
journalist friend, Robert Caulfield. Whitter suddenly vanishes, and when Caulfield goes to
Whitter's apartment the next day, he discovers someone else living there and that all evidence of
Whitter's recent life has been erased. As Caulfield investigates, several attempts are made on his
life.

Upon returning to Earth, the empty spacecraft burns up during atmospheric reentry due to a faulty
heat shield, which would have killed the astronauts had they been on board. The astronauts realize
officials will need to kill them to keep the hoax a secret. They escape in a small jet which quickly
runs out of fuel, forcing a crash-landing in the desert. They split up on foot to increase their
chances of finding help and exposing the plot. Kelloway sends helicopters after them. Willis and
Walker are found, while Brubaker evades capture.

Caulfield interviews Brubaker's "widow" after reviewing a televised conversation between the
astronauts and their wives. Mrs. Brubaker had seemed confused when her husband mentioned
their last family vacation. She explains that the family had actually gone to a different location,
where a western movie was being filmed. Brubaker was intrigued by how special effects and
technology made it seem real.

Caulfield believes Brubaker would never make such a mistake and may have been sending his wife
a message. Caulfield goes to the deserted western movie set and is shot at. As he investigates
further, federal agents break into his home, arresting him for possessing cocaine that they planted
there. His exasperated boss bails Caulfield out, then fires him.

A reporter friend tells Caulfield about an abandoned military base located 300 miles (480 km)
from Houston. The base is deserted, but Caulfield finds Brubaker's necklace and medallion and
concludes the astronauts were there. Caulfield hires a crop-dusting pilot named Albain to search
the desert. They spot and follow two helicopters to a closed isolated gas station where Brubaker is
hiding. They rescue him as he attempts to escape his pursuers. The helicopters chase their plane
through a canyon but crash when Albain blinds them with crop spray.

Ultimately, Caulfield and Brubaker arrive at the astronauts' memorial service, where Kelloway and
Brubaker's wife see them and live network TV coverage exposes the truth.

Cast
Elliott Gould as Robert Caulfield
James Brolin as Charles Brubaker
Brenda Vaccaro as Kay Brubaker
Sam Waterston as Peter Willis
O. J. Simpson as John Walker
Hal Holbrook as Dr. James Kelloway

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Karen Black as Judy Drinkwater

Telly Savalas as Albain
David Huddleston as Hollis Peaker
David Doyle as Walter Loughlin
Lee Bryant as Sharon Willis
Denise Nicholas as Betty Walker
Robert Walden as Elliot Whitter
Alan Fudge as Capsule Communicator

Production

Development

Peter Hyams began thinking about a film of a space hoax while working on broadcasts of the
Apollo missions for CBS. He later reflected regarding the Apollo 11 Moon landing, "There was one
event of really enormous importance that had almost no witnesses. And the only verification we
have ... came from a TV camera."[2]

He later elaborated:

Whenever there was something on the news about a [space flight], they would cut to a
studio in St. Louis where there was a simulation of what was going on. I grew up in the
generation where my parents basically believed if it was in the newspaper it was true.
That turned out to be bullshit. My generation was brought up to believe television was
true, and that was bullshit too. So I was watching these simulations and I wondered
what would happen if someone faked a whole story.[3]

Hyams wrote the script in 1972 but no one wanted to make it. He says interest in the script was re-
activated by the Watergate Scandal. He approached producer Paul Lazarus. Hyams and Lazarus
had a meeting with Lew Grade, head of production company ITC Entertainment who had recently
moved into film production with The Return of the Pink Panther. Grade agreed to make the film
after only five minutes.[4] The budget was $4.8 million.[5][6][2]

Grade announced the film in October 1975 as a part of a slate of ten films he intended to make over
the next 12 months, including The Domino Principle, Action - Clear the Fast Lanes and Juarez.
The last two were ultimately not made.[7]

To stay within the budget, NASA's co-operation was needed. Lazarus had a good relationship with
the space agency from Futureworld. The filmmakers were thus able to obtain government
equipment as props despite the negative portrayal of the space agency, including a prototype
Apollo Lunar Module.[8]

In September 1976, it was announced the cast would include Elliott Gould, O.J. Simpson, James
Brolin, Brenda Vaccaro, and Candice Bergen.[9] The presence of Brolin and Simpson in the cast
helped secure a presale to NBC.[4] Ultimately Bergen pulled out and was replaced by Karen Black.

Shooting

Filming started in January 1977. Shooting locations included Cinema Center Films in Studio City,
and Red Rock Canyon State Park.[4]
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Hyams later joked, "O. J. Simpson was in it, and Robert Blake was in Busting [Hyams' first
feature]. I've said many times: Some people have AFI Lifetime Achievement awards; some people
have multiple Oscars; my bit of trivia is that I've made films with two leading men who were
subsequently tried for the first-degree murder of their wives."[3]

Release
The film originally was scheduled to debut in the United States in February 1978, but good preview
screenings and delays in Superman caused it to move to June. Capricorn One became the year's
most-successful independent film.[5][10]

Hyams later said:

Audiences just stood up and cheered at one point in the film. It wasn't because it was
such a great movie, it's just that certain movies strike certain chords with people. In a
successful movie, the audience, almost before they see it, know they're going to like it. I
remember standing in the back of the theater and crying because I knew that
something had changed in my life. Sitting on the film cans outside the screening room,
I felt my cheeks were wet with tears. A bright man, [studio executive] David Picker
came over to me and said, 'You're going to have a lot of new best friends tomorrow. You
better know how to handle it.'[11]

Reception
Vincent Canby of The New York Times called the film "an expensive, stylistically bankrupt
suspense melodrama" while describing much of its screenplay as "humorless comic-strip stuff."[12]
Conversely, Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune gave the film three-and-a-half stars out of four and
called it "a surprisingly good thriller" with a runaway car sequence "that provides some of the best
action footage I've seen in a long time."[13] Variety faulted the film's "underdeveloped script" and
"scattershot casting", calling the duo of Savalas and Gould "a bullseye" but Waterston and
Simpson lacking in "group chemistry".[14]

Kevin Thomas of the Los Angeles Times thought the beginning of the film was the best part, and
what follows "is wildly uneven, veering between the serious and the merely silly, and ending up
likely to please only the least demanding."[15] Gary Arnold of The Washington Post wrote,
"Capricorn One harks back to the old adventure serials, but Hyams doesn't have remotely enough
wit or technique to achieve a fresh stylization of vintage formulas."[16]

Richard Combs of The Monthly Film Bulletin stated "Somewhere within this flabby, overproduced
fantasy about space-age double-dealing and Watergate-type sleuthing lives a smaller, tighter film
—and a much wittier satire on the space program and technologies, like Hollywood, designed to
deceive and manipulate. The trouble is that this more ideal version is not really struggling to get
out but wallowing complacently in the limitless excess that has become the Lew Grade
trademark."[17]

In a retrospective review, AllMovie critic Donald Guarisco wrote: "This agreeable high-concept
effort is one of Peter Hyams' most accomplished films. The script's conspiracy-theory premise
requires a major suspension of disbelief, but Hyams makes it worthwhile for those willing to make
that leap."[18]

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Capricorn One holds a 64% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 22 reviews, with an
average rating of 6.2/10. The site's consensus states: "A string of questionable plot contrivances
threaten to bury its story, but Capricorn One manages to unfurl an amusing, sharply cynical
conspiracy yarn."[19]

Other media

UK version, by Ken US novelization of

Follett (as Bernard L. Capricorn One, by Ron
Ross) Goulart

Two novelizations of the film were written and published by separate authors. The first was written
by Ken Follett (under the pseudonym Bernard L. Ross) and published in the United Kingdom; the
other was written by Ron Goulart and published in the United States.[20]

The Follett novel is notable for giving Robert Caulfield more development than the movie does,
including giving him something of a relationship with CBS reporter Judy Drinkwater (who has
more time in the book than in the movie) and ending the book with him and Judy. The story saves
his career and results in his being employed by CBS.

Clips from the faked Mars landing scenes have been used for illustration purposes in various Moon
landing hoax conspiracy documentaries, notably the Fox TV show Conspiracy Theory: Did We
Land on the Moon and Bart Sibrel's film A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Moon
(2001). The latter also features a still shot from the hoax scene on the DVD's front cover.

In 2020–2021, Capricorn One was used as part of an internet prank. A viral video purported to be
released by WikiLeaks was uploaded to BitChute, Twitter, Facebook and other social media
platforms and blogs with a title: "WIKILEAKS RELEASES - MOON LANDING CUT SCENE -
FILMED IN NEVADA DESERT". In fact, WikiLeaks released no such video. Close inspection
revealed this prank video to be made using clips from Capricorn One and even various film reels
shot on the set of Capricorn One, which were then cut and spliced with stock footage from the
Apollo missions and training sessions.[21]

See also
Moon landing conspiracy theories
Diamonds Are Forever (film) - "Moon buggy" scene

References
1. Cohn, Lawrence (October 15, 1990). "All-Time Film Rental Champs". Variety. p. M150.
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2. Spacesuit: Fashioning Apollo (https://books.google.com/books?id=IT-chpAkCZ0C&pg=PA259),

Nicholas de Monchaux, MIT Press, 2011. This book cites the New York Times as stating
"Watergate may not have inspired 'Capricorn One,' but it made its thesis more acceptable, its
plot more credible and some of its content strangely prophetic."
3. "Peter Hyams Film by Film" Empire (https://www.empireonline.com/movies/features/peter-hya
ms-film-film/) accessed 29 Dec 2020
4. The Film That Watergate Got Off the Ground. Warga, Wayne. Los Angeles Times 30 Jan
1977: s36.
5. Szebin, 2000
6. Lew Grade, Still Dancing: My Story, William Collins & Sons 1987 p 247
7. Sir Lew's massive film deal. Barker, Dennis. The Guardian 22 Oct 1975: 7.
8. The Space Shot as a Sham. Kilday, Gregg. Los Angeles Times 13 Oct 1976: f9.
9. Pepitone will run disco in Las Vegas Daly, Maggie. Chicago Tribune 14 Sep 1976: b12.
10. What If a Mars Landing Were Faked? Asks Peter Hyams: A Fake Landing On Mars?
Nightingale, Benedict. New York Times 28 May 1978: D10.
11. Interview with Peter Hyams by Luke Ford (http://www.lukeford.net/profiles/profiles/peter_hyam
s.htm) accessed 27 July 2014
12. Canby, Vincent (June 2, 1978). "Film: 'Capricorn One' " (https://www.nytimes.com/1978/06/02/a
rchives/film-capricorn-one.html). The New York Times. Retrieved May 3, 2019.
13. Siskel, Gene (June 8, 1978). "'Capricorn' is a pure joy ride". Chicago Tribune. Section 2, p. 4.
14. "Film Reviews: Capricorn One". Variety. June 7, 1978. 25.
15. Thomas, Kevin (June 2, 1978). "Meanwhile, Back at the Launch..." Los Angeles Times. Part IV,
p. 24.
16. Arnold, Gary (June 6, 1978). "Hoax: 'Capricorn One' Never Gets Off the Ground". The
Washington Post. B5.
17. Combs, Richard (July 1978). "Capricorn One". The Monthly Film Bulletin. 45 (534): 131.
18. Guarisco, Donald. "Capricorn One: Review" (http://www.allmovie.com/movie/capricorn-one-v80
71/review). AllMovie. Retrieved August 1, 2016.
19. "Capricorn One" (https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/capricorn_one). Rotten Tomatoes.
20. Allison, 2007.
21. "Fact check: WikiLeaks did not release footage that proves moon landing staged" (https://www.
usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2022/01/28/fact-check-wikileaks-did-not-release-staged-m
oon-landing-footage/9217263002/). USA Today.

Sources
Bancroft, Colette (September 29, 2002). "Lunar lunacy" (https://web.archive.org/web/20110628
204716/http://www.sptimes.com/2002/09/29/Floridian/Lunar_lunacy.shtml). St. Petersburg
Times. Archived from the original (http://www.sptimes.com/2002/09/29/Floridian/Lunar_lunacy.
shtml) on June 28, 2011. Retrieved January 7, 2013.
Szebin, Frederick C. (April 20, 2000). "The Making of Capricorn One" (https://web.archive.org/
web/20090302200222/http://www.mania.com/making-capricorn-one_article_20701.html).
Mania. Archived from the original (http://www.mania.com/making-capricorn-one_article_20701.
html) on 2009-03-02. Retrieved January 7, 2013.
Allison, Deborah (May 2007). "Film/Print: Novelisations and Capricorn One" (http://journal.medi
a-culture.org.au/0705/07-allison.php). M/C Journal. 10 (2). doi:10.5204/mcj.2633 (https://doi.or
g/10.5204%2Fmcj.2633). Retrieved January 7, 2013.

External links
Capricorn One (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077294/) at IMDb

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Capricorn One (https://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title/20340/enwp) at the TCM Movie Database

Capricorn One (https://www.allmovie.com/movie/v8071) at AllMovie
Capricorn One (https://catalog.afi.com/Catalog/moviedetails/56233) at the American Film
Institute Catalog
Capricorn One (https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/capricorn_one) at Rotten Tomatoes

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