The poster for Apollo 18 says there’s a reason we’ve never gone back to the moon

As I mentioned a couple of weeks back, there’s a new race to the moon and the Weinsteins seem hellbent on getting there first.

Their “found footage” sci-fi project APOLLO 18 already has a poster and a release date of March 4, 2011 — which gives just-assigned director Gonzalo Lopez-Gallego (who replaced FX guy Trevor Cawood) a little over three months to slap a feature film together so Dimension can thrust it into theaters. Timur Bekmambetov (WANTED) is producing (rapidly).

Here’s the deal: “A quintessential Cold War story, Apollo 18 casts light on the covert and undocumented lunar mission that officially “never happened.” Bekmambetov, hired by Russia to shoot a documentary about the Russian space station, recently came across footage in its space archives that bolsters the idea that an Apollo 18 mission did, in fact, take place, and reveals startling evidence of extraterrestrial life forms. This actual footage will be part of Apollo 18, a paranormal thriller that will interpolate fact and fiction.”

The project is hustling to the launch pad to beat Joel Silver’s similarly themed DARK MOON.