So for decades scientists across the world have been fooled by hollywood magic and anyone that isn't is what? Paid off? All for the sake of holding on to a moon landing? I mean we clearly have the capabilities to enter space now days. What if they just came out and we're like "hey...so that iconic moon landing was fake. But we needed money to figure out how to really get onto space first and thst was the only way we could get the money. And it worked. Now we're in space!" People would initially feel betrayed, but there wouldn't be mass riots or falling of governments. NASA would take a publicity hit and things would go back to normal. Keeping up the ruse seems pointless.
But you're talking about billions of dollars that are at stake, that are being wasted.
Think about it, just a year earlier, Kubrick made 2001: A Space Odyssey, He didn't make that film after the "moon landing" but a year before.
Why would Kubrick have the little boy wear an Apollo 11 sweater? That wasn't in the book
Why was room 237 so important, when in the book, the important room number was 217? Some say that Kubrick was telling people that moon is supposed to be roughly 237,000 miles from earth.
Just look up some of the stuff and decide for yourself. I'm not trying to change your mind, but I am just skeptical about things like the moon landing.
Getting to space and getting to the moon are 2 different challenges.
In terms of keeping up the ruse, the majority of people put so much faith in what they are told and shown, that anything that would contradict that would send them into a roller coaster ride of emotions. All that they believed in turned out to be a lie. That wouldn't sit well with people because the first thing they are going to ask is "why is NASA getting all this money?" We want to believe in American Exceptionalism so bad that we'll overlook and disregard logical questions.