MovieChat Forums > The Dish (2001) Discussion > The events of the Dish leaves a big prob...

The events of the Dish leaves a big problem for hoax proponents

posted 19 years ago by g-stickings
28 replies | jump to latest

The Dish has to be one of my favourite films.

As well as being a good film, it does highlight a piece of historical information that those who say that the moon landings never happended have over looked.

Many other countries outside of the USA were able to track Apollo 11, and would have cried foul if this was a put up show. some of these countries were hostile to the US, and would have made great capital if they could expose a hoax, yet they acknowledged it as genuine.

When I discussed this film on www.badastronomy.com we had a number of posters from Austrailia who had first hand knowlege of the Parkes observatory, and their insite was enlightening.

[–] arthur_pewtey 19 years ago

Yeah,

But what you don't realise is that there is a grand conspiracy. And the best part of the conspiracy is that the only people who are ever leaked proof are those completely lacking in credibility...

[–] 19 years ago

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[–] Tony-166 19 years ago

As a Brit, I have been constantly dismayed by the continued "popularity" of the idea of a conspiracy surrounding the Apollo moon missions. It does such an enormous dis-service to the vast number of folk who spent their lives in achieving the single greatest technological feat in the history of mankind. Some of these people put their lives on the line.

Jodrell Bank radio telescope still uses reflector devices placed on the moon during the Apollo missions to make accurate measurements of the moons distance.

Apart from all that though, "The Dish" is a beautifully made and acted film. A real heart-warmer.

[–] argusx 19 years ago

> The problem in your thesis is that Australia is the US' lapdog, and not one of those countries hostile to the US!

The Soviet Union and East Germany were hostile to the U.S. Both had the capability to track all the Apollo missions. If they detected any hint of deception, they would have screamed bloody murder. Unless you believe the Soviet bloc was also a 'US lapdog'.

[–] 19 years ago

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[–] sdorph 18 years ago

Facts never cause problems for hoax proponents.

If the facts don't fit their hypothesis they will be ignored, belittled or flat out denied.

'In order for one to be affected by insults, one must have some respect for their source'

[–] southwestern71 18 years ago

Though the Australian film industry is small even by British standards a disproportionately large number of their films are outstanding. The Australian film industries influence in the media of cinema is out of all proportion to its size.

The Dish may not be in the same league as films such as Picnic at Hanging Rock, Breaker Morant, Muriel's Wedding or The Proposition but it is a pleasant comedy & similar to Muriel's Wedding dispels the image of the wild outback colonial boy by depicting life in modern Australia.

Anyone interested in how far the film The Dish deviated from fact log on to http://members.pcug.org.au/~mdinn/TheDish/

The only way we will ever know if the Apollo 11 Moon landing was a hoax is to send a privately funded expedition to the lunar lading site. As there is a growing commercial interest in space exploration in Europe & Asia it’s a slim possibility.

[–] armoury_pacnet 17 years ago

"The only way we will ever know if the Apollo 11 Moon landing was a hoax is to send a privately funded expedition to the lunar lading site. "

Just one problem: those who think it was a hoax will say this expedition is hoax too! ;-)

I've always been a space buff, thoroughly enjoyed From The Earth To The Moon and Apollo 13, as well as The Dish, and think it is just such an insult that these conspiracy clowns denigrate what is undoubtedly one of humanity's finest technological achievements to date.

Come to think of it, it shouldn't be long before telescopes are powerful enough to resolve the lower half of the lunar landers still on the Moon?

[–] 17 years ago

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[–] MonkeyPablo 17 years ago

The biggest problem with the Hoax theories is that they state not only was the initial moon landing in 1969 a hoax, but all subsequent landings were too. Why on earth would the US hoax a moon landing, then hoax it another 5 times, vastly increasing the chance of being caught? Lunacy (do you see what I did there??) :o)

[–] GeorgeFan 17 years ago

Boom tish ;)
I'm pleased somebody bought this up though, cos I was thinking about this the whole way through the film. Right at the end, when the pictures came through, I got shivers, and this was just from a film! I'd be gutted if it then turned out that excitement wasn't real.
On the other hand, a small part of me laughs very hard at the idea that the US is making these small, indie Aussie films to try waylay suspicion

[–] skin_job 17 years ago

Why on earth would the US hoax a moon landing, then hoax it another 5 times, vastly increasing the chance of being caught?

Not only that, but why on Earth would NASA fake the Apollo 13 near-disaster if they didn't have to? The whole idea of faking the moon landings was supposedly to make NASA and the U.S. look good wasn't it?

C'mon, Hitler, I'll buy you a glass of lemonade

[–] richimorton 16 years ago

I was just going to make that point Monkeypab - thanks - i think the only real conspiracy involving the Lunar landings is the perpetuating of the hoax theory itself ! This way ALL conspiracies are laughed at (when perhaps some need looking at seriously)..........Thermate anyone ???

That which does not Kill me makes me Stranger . . .

[–] iwals 17 years ago

If Neil Armstrong was the first to walk on the moon, then who was outside holding the camera? Huh, answer me that! :)

[–] paulcoxwell 17 years ago

If Neil Armstrong was the first to walk on the moon, then who was outside holding the camera?

Nobody. The camera was mounted on an arm which allowed it to be deployed from the side of the module, precisely so that man's first step onto the lunar surface could be captured for posterity.

[–] LaserDoug 17 years ago

Actually, the camera was laying in a tray in a kind of "tool box"
that was mounted to the side of the LEM. It was actually sitting
upside down (made for better vibration isolation on landing),
and it was only facing right side up when it was put on a tripod
for the big pictures later on in the day. There was all sorts of
problems with the picture being sent back to earth upside down,
and all the image converters back on earth had an extra switch
added to the control panels so the ops guys could flip the picture
right way round. There's a great PDF file from the guys that were
in charge of all the video for the moon mission, I got it from the
Parkes site, I'll try and post some links for it here, has lot of
pictures of things like the camera's, and the gear that was
installed in Parkes for this event. It's kinda heavy on the tech
stuff, but still a great read from the guys that really were
there..

d.

[–] TheGrillTeam 16 years ago

Remember also that conspiracy theorists point to a lack of evidence as proof too, because it indicates a cover-up.

[–] Cactus-7 16 years ago

If you had paid attention to the film, you would have heard the explanation of how the pictures were taken. It's hard to believe there are still goobers around trying to push the "Moon Landing Never Happened" theory. What a bunch of emotional cripples.

[–] ben-wiegert 16 years ago

The reason quality differs so much from different footage are these:
TV-images sent to Earth in real time have very poor quality with todays standards
Film-clips fimed onboard are better since they were developed at earth after a mission

and still pictures are as good as the ones made today, since they are made by normal film camera.

Also, on Apollo 12, there are no live footage because the astronauts managed to point the camera directly into the sun by mistake, so no pictures.

[–] Tony-166 14 years ago

One of the oddest things about the still cameras used in the Apollo 11 mission was that they were modified Hasselblads without viewfinders. I don't know why. Buzz Aldrin mentions it in his autobiography. So they were actually shooting "blind". One of the most famous images in photographic history, Neil Armstrong reflected in Buzz Aldrin's space helmet, was a pure accident.

[–] alto_saxophone 14 years ago

I think the reason they didn't use a viewfinder is the same reason some underwater pictures are taken without a viewfinder. Normal viewfinders require you to put your eye right up against them. If you're wearing a spacesuit, your eye is already some distance from the glass of the spacesuit. If the camera has any additional housing (I don't know if it did), then that would take the viewfinder even further from the eye. Similar problems arise when diving underwater. I've seen underwater cameras that have a square bracket mounted on top of the camera. You use that bracket to frame your shot without looking through the viewfinder.

[–] Tony-166 14 years ago

yes - That makes a lot of sense. I hadn't thought about the helmets.

[–] riccom 8 years ago

Come to think of it, it shouldn't be long before telescopes are powerful enough to resolve the lower half of the lunar landers still on the Moon?

It's difficult trying to peer through the earth's atmosphere, but was done by a fly-by telescope in 2009.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunar_Reconnaissance_Orbiter

http://leslie-special.info In appreciation of The Great Race.

[–] SeanDx 12 years ago

For me I (maybe because I have an inquiring mind) I found the conspiracies theories interesting, but eventually dismissed them, and for me the clincher is the footage, especially that taken from either craft in lunar orbit, and with the moon surface passing behind.
When Star Wars came out the special effects were impressive. Now we look at them and they seem crude.
Jurassic Park effects were good when we first saw them, but now my kids say 'that's so fake...'.
If they faked that footage in the 60s we would see through it straight away today, but it is still convincing.

[–] Oblivion14 12 years ago

Conspiracy theorists always tend to style themselves as the "true" skeptics. But there's a time when skepticism starts to loop back into blind belief. And that's where they're at. Some are truly paranoid (those tend to also believe in other conspiracy theories like the NWO), some are simply uneducated and gullible enough when plied with enough big words, while others are simply those who can't stand being wrong.

Either way, when faced with increasing evidence against them, their reaction is to extend the conspiracy. Such that aside from the Moon Landing, they start denying the reality of everything else - everything from dating techniques to the most basic physics becomes untrue the moment they lend support to the Moon landing. So yes, they'll just say that Parkes was complicit, like one of the posters apparently did already.

What I find alarming is that the number of Americans believing in it is rising. Helped by the unscrupulous jingoistic propaganda machine they call the Fox Network. It's no wonder the US is starting to fall behind when it comes to science.

[–] Strings101 12 years ago

Apparently Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos--who was only 5 years old during Apollo 11--is "in on it" too.

http://www.bezosexpeditions.com/updates.html

With incredible foresight, NASA (or Jeff's parents?... or Santa Claus?), back around 1969, "salted" a bunch of "hoax" F-1 rocket engines into the Atlantic ocean, at location a hundred miles or so off the FL-GA border, at a spot "only" 14,000(!) feet deep, so they'd be "easy" to find and raise up. Of course they first ran over the rocket engines with a truck, so it would appear that they had crashed into the ocean from a very high altitude.

HINT to the STEM-challenged: When a "hoax" requires *more* money, effort, technology, and brain-sweat than ACTUALLY GOING TO THE MOON, it's probably time to retire that hoax "theory".

[–] 2jdv 9 years ago

A somewhat newer hoax theory idea actually proves the opposite! No stars in the background, so couldn't have been on the moon! But the moon's surface is highly reflective and no atmosphere to dim the sun even slightly, so the camera had to have a tiny aperture to block out the glare--so much so the stars wouldn't appear. If they had made up the whole thing on a Hollywood lot, there would have been stars! And if they had done it in a sound studio they would of course have painted in stars in the background, not needing to think about the actual conditions and thinking it would be more realistic.

But then, we all know the Earth is flat anyway, so ALL the shots from "space" are fake.

[–] Snaggelpuss 8 years ago

These crazy conspiracists just ignore facts like most other ones, eg 911 religions, creatards, kennedy ass even tho there is some actual huge problems .