Fly Me to the Moon (2024) review

During the Cold War years, the United States and Soviet Union were in competition with each other to see who could make more progress in space travel, so mysterious "fixer" Moe Berkus (Woody Harrelson) hires marketing guru Kelly Jones (Scarlett Johansson) to work for NASA and help "sell" their future plans to not only the American public but members of Congress as well, except launch director Cole Davis (Channing Tatum) is a stubborn fuddy duddy who doesn't want her around.  It plays with a famous conspiracy theory that the Moon landing was faked - Kelly is forced by Moe to get snippy filmmaker Lance Vespertine (Jim Rash) to record "alternative" footage of the astronauts bouncing on a dusty set (and Stanley Kubrick is name-checked) - and seems like it wants to be this Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy-ish vehicle, although it's lacking in both wit and originality (a bookish male "learns" that women can function outside the kitchen).  The scenes involving the Apollo 11 taking off are well-done but tonally they belong in a different movie altogether - likewise, it quickly brings up (and then conveniently brushes aside) the exorbitant price tag for these "vanity" projects - which were supposed to "distract" the Americans from what was happening in Vietnam - and how that money would have been better spent on desperate individuals who needed it the most.  But I digress....