Coming to EPIX today, Wednesday, April 3: LUNARCY!
Simon Ennis’ survey of moon-obsessives had its world premiere at Toronto last year. It’s gone on to screen at Calgary, Vancouver, Global Visions, and SXSW, among other fests.
As signaled by Ennis’ deliberately hyperbolic title (though awkward and redundant – LUNACY! would have been just as effective instead of the punny neologism), his film is meant to be fun. For the most part, it succeeds in this goal, taking a generally light approach in its profile of several men who have the moon on their minds – from Christopher, the key subject, who lobbies for lunar colonization, and Peter, who’s been publishing a speculative guide to life on the moon for over twenty years, to Dennis, the shady real estate entrepreneur who sells deeds to parcels of lunar property, and Alan, a former astronaut who uses moondust in his space-themed paintings. These characters, to varying degrees, inspire sympathy or incredulity, and are just quirky enough to engage the viewer’s attention and curiosity without delving too deeply. It’s an enjoyable film with a simple premise, and is, like its subjects, relatively harmless – even Dennis only makes about $20 per plot from his suspect business – but for these reasons, it’s also unlikely to rank as an indelible portrait of obsession for most audiences.
what (not) to doc 