The Swarm

I'm not always the quickest learner so I'll take the blame for this one. I guess I should have learned quicker. While there are exceptions, there just weren't many good disaster movies in the 1970s and then into the 1980s. So for every Airport, Towering Inferno and Poseidon Adventure, there are movies like 1978's The Swarm. Yep, another nail in the coffin of a genre struggling to hold on for dear life.

At an isolated army installation in the American Southwest, a heavily armed patrol slowly navigates the eerily empty facility. What the hell happened here? Deep underground at the installation, the investigating patrol finds several dead bodies and a few lucky survivors, including a mysterious doctor, Brad Crane (Michael Caine), who says he's an expert on the world of insects. A much larger army force, commanded by crotchety General Slater (Richard Widmark), arrives soon after, and they're too stunned at what they find and what Crane claims is behind the mysterious attack. The responsibility goes to....an immense swarm of African killer bees. Bees!!!! Making the situation worse, there's no cure for the bees' surprisingly venomous sting and seemingly no one is immune. It looks like nothing can stop the not-so-fast moving bees, and they're heading for Houston.

Sometimes you DO just know. When this 1978 disaster flick from director Irwin Allen -- Master of Disaster flicks -- popped up on Turner Classic Movies' schedule, I had to set it to record. I HAD to. Movies with casts like this don't pop up too often so I had to at least give it a try. Worst case, it's just entertaining in a bad, guilty pleasure fashion, right? Well, that's what you would think. This wasn't even good in a 'So bad it's good' way. It just isn't entertaining. Apparently, I'm not the only one who thinks so. 'Swarm' is on all sorts of worst movies ever made lists and bombed in epic fashion in theaters back in 1978. If that's not a recipe for success, I don't know what is!

Maybe the most frightening thing to take away from this bee-disaster flick is that there's a director's cut available out there clocking in at 156 minutes. The TCM version I saw was an already painfully long 116 minutes. God knows what else could be expanded on in an additional 40 minutes because I was losing interest in the shortened version at the 60-minute mark. For goodness sake, 'Swarm' utilizes a love triangle featuring Olivia de Havilland, Ben Johnson and Fred MacMurray (in his last role) as a subplot! Yes, because that's what we need, three Hollywood legends in a senior citizen love triangle in a disaster flick where a swarm of killer bees are the villains. Seems reasonable, don't it? I can't say I'd be too interested in seeking out that longer version of a dud like this.

Star Michael Caine has said this is the worst movie he ever made, and it's hard to disagree. As the insect/bug specialist, Caine looks to be immensely bored throughout. If there's a slightly redeeming quality in 'Swarm,' it's that the cast is epically impressive. Now are any of them given much of anything to do? That would be a big N-O, but still, look at all those Hollywood stars! Along with Caine and perpetually angry Widmark, look for Katharine Ross, Henry Fonda and Richard Chamberlain as some of the scientists tasked with halting the advance of the bees.  Also look for Lee Grant, Jose Ferrer, Patty Duke, Bradford Dillman, Slim Pickens, and Cameron Mitchell in other supporting parts, some more painfully forced than others.

Things unfortunately develop in more spoof-fashion than straight disaster flick. How many slow motion bee attack scenes can we witness before it just becomes laughable? Because the movie is about bees, we get one hilarious scene after another about our very talented cast discussing what the bees' intentions are, if they're seeking revenge, if there is a major bee plan to take over the world. It's all done so straight that it becomes spoof-like, and that's never a good thing. The problem is there just isn't that one reason to sit back and watch this one, and that's considering the star power on hand. The cast is given little to nothing to do, the killer bees are a laughable "villain," and the entertainment value just isn't there. Give this one a wide berth.

The Swarm (1978): */****

Shenandoah

As far as directing powerhouses of the 1960s, Andrew V. McLaglen will never be remembered as one of the greats. He started off in television before making the jump to feature film, teaming several times with John Wayne while also specializing in audience friendly "guy movies." Good guys versus bad guys, lots of familiar faces and situations, you know the formula. One of his best? An underrated Civil War drama, 1965's Shenandoah.

It's 1864 in Virginia, and the tide of the Civil War has turned as the Union forces are slowly beating down the Confederate armies. Doing his best to remain free of the bloody fighting, farmer and patriarch Charlie Anderson (James Stewart) wants nothing to do with the war. Both for himself and his family -- seven kids, one daughter-in-law -- Anderson simply wants to keep working his 500-acre farm and get through the war unscathed. Fight for Virginia? Fight for slaves he doesn't have? He fights for what he believes in, his family and his farm. Well, that's what he'd like to do. While the fighting rages on, Charlie is stunned when he finds out his youngest son (Phillip Alford) has been confused as a Confederate soldier and captured by nearby Union forces. Now the war and the fighting that Anderson has done so well to steer clear of has landed square on his front porch. Can he find his son amidst the hell of war?

This was a movie I watched often growing up when my sister and I had sleepovers with my Grandma. It made an excellent Civil War double feature with Friendly Persuasion, and let me tell ya, they both hold up! I watched this McLaglen-directed Civil War drama for the first time in years, and it resonated just as much now as an adult as it did when I was a kid, if not more. McLaglen had some excellent movies to his name -- The Wild Geese is a favorite, Hondo, McLintock are also excellent -- but this is his best movie overall. The story is a series of very effective, often moving and often disturbing vignettes, all held together by the Anderson family. Filmed on-location in Oregon and California, 'Shenandoah' is an underrated visual film, and the musical score from composer Frank Skinner is a gem. So what stands out viewing this one as a 29-year old, not a 13-year old kid?

That would be James Stewart, one of my favorites in just about any movie he's in. This doesn't get the attention or notoriety as one of Stewart's best performances, but it certainly belongs in the conversation. I love what he does with the part of Charlie Anderson, a stubborn, feisty Virginia farmer and widower looking out for the best intentions of his family. He doesn't care about the war, about slavery, about Union and Confederate. He will do anything, ANYTHING, to protect his family. Stewart has some great scenes with the younger supporting cast, especially Alford's youngest son, only called 'Boy,' with his daughter, Jenny (Rosemary Forsyth), daughter-in-law, Anne (Katharine Ross), and his sons. There are too many memorable, emotional scenes to mention, but my favorites are the most simple. Minutes before the Andersons go to church each Sunday, Charlie visits his wife's grave and just talks to her. Simple perfection, Stewart absolutely nailing the underplayed but charged scenes. 

Stewart is the unquestioned star of McLaglen's film, but 'Shenandoah' offers quite the ensemble of recognizable faces. Glenn Corbett and Patrick Wayne play Jacob and James, the two oldest brothers. Corbett especially stands out as Jacob who's beginning to question if their choice to stay out of the war is the right decision. Wayne is solid too, especially in his scenes with Ross. In her film debut, Forsyth is excellent, a subtle scene-stealer as innocent, tough and thoughtful Jenny who's also interested in a young Confederate soldier, Sam (Doug McClure). The other Anderson boys include Charles Robinson, Jim McMullan and Tim McIntire. Maybe the best thing you can say about the story is that the family dynamic, it just works. You believe them as one cohesive unit, one that stands together through thick and thin.

But wait, there's more! Also look for George Kennedy as a sympathetic Union officer, Gene Jackson as Gabriel, a friend of Boy's, a slave, Paul Fix as the local doctor, Denver Pyle as the pastor, James Best as Carter, a fellow prisoner who takes Boy under his wing, Harry Carey Jr. as another Confederate prisoner, Tom Simcox as Lt. Johnson, a Confederate officer, with Kevin Hagen, Dabbs Greer and Strother Martin also playing small but memorable parts.

So 29-year old me certainly picked up some new things, or at least was able to process things differently. This is one hell of an anti-war flick. The portrayal of the latter stages of the Civil War is unsettling and often times, disturbing. Death awaits around every corner, hiding behind every tree. The lines are up in the air as the war takes a turn toward its ultimate conclusion. A late battle between a small Confederate camp and a larger Union force with heavy artillery is quick and awful and uncomfortable, one of the more underrated battle sequences I can think of. The last half hour especially features one kick in the gut after another that truly hammers home the anti-war message. And that last scene? Pretty perfect, the possibility of hope lingering in the air amongst all this pain and suffering and death. One of my favorite movies.

Shenandoah (1965): ****/****

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid

When you start reading about movie stars, the flicks they were in, and the processes it took to get these movies made, interesting tidbits of trivia always seem to pop up.  Some of my favorites are finding out what movies the stars didn't pick to act in.  Can you imagine Steve McQueen playing The Sundance Kid alongside Paul Newman? I can't say I'm not curious to see how that would have turned out, but it's hard to picture anyone but Newman and Robert Redford in the classic 1969 western Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.

Say anything you want about this movie, but I've yet to find anyone who can't appreciate the chemistry between Newman and Redford.  It's a change of pace for a western released in the late 1960s, a mix of comedy and action with a big dollop of the buddy movie thrown in.  It doesn't go as far as revising the old west, but it certainly is a more romantic portrayal of a time that was really anything but romantic.  Director George Roy Hill tells the story of two real outlaws though, and he picked the right two historical bandits. Yes, they robbed banks and trains, rustled cattle, and lived outside of the law, but all sorts of records exist that in real life these two men were actually pretty affable guys.  That's the movie. If there are two better characters, more likable characters in a movie, I'm hard-pressed to think of them.

It's the first few years of the 1900s, and the wild west is dying out as civilization, technology, and the future are taking over.  Leading the Hole in the Wall gang, outlaws Butch Cassidy (Newman) and the Sundance Kid (Redford) hang on to the last gasps of the life they know, robbing banks and trains for the easy pickings.  But the window is closing on the outlaw life as the railroad company hires a super-posse to hunt them down and kill them.  So along with Sundance's girlfriend, Etta Place (Katharine Ross), the outlaw duo travel to Bolivia to avoid being caught.  But no matter what they do, it doesn't seem to work for them, and it's only a matter of time before the door completely closes on them.

Reviewing this movie, it's hard to describe the plot because there isn't much of a plot.  And as I read back over, that review is much darker than the actual tone of the movie.  However, whether you know the real life history of Butch and Sundance or not, at a certain point you can predict how this movie is going to end.  It is a western that deals with the closing days of the west, and the men who refuse to change with the times.  'B and S' doesn't go down the dark route that The Wild Bunch does, but that doesn't take away from the still-moving ending (but more on that later).  The tone here is light and comedic, only building to a darker conclusion because it is the natural course of things.  There's no way to change the ending without seriously handicapping the rest of the movie.

For starters, Newman and Redford are two of the most likable Hollywood stars to ever star in a movie.  Then throw in this great script from William Goldman that allows them to have these great dialogue exchanges full of great comedic one-liners, and you've got this perfect storm of acting and writing.  Read IMDB's Memorable Quotes for an idea of some of the phenomenal writing, which even out of context is still priceless. Newman as the affable, joking Butch and Redford as the more serious Sundance have this banter down to an art with a chemistry that hasn't been duplicated in westerns or action movies since.  The best test is the end though after  a gunfight goes horrifically wrong and both men -- gravely wounded -- continue to bitch and moan at each other.  Staring death in the face (whether they know it or not), they still argue back and forth.  Outlaws yes, and maybe a bit more romantically portrayed than actual wild west outlaws, but my all-time favorite teaming of two actors.

With a virtually plotless story, the movie allows Newman and Redford to experiment with their parts, and certain parts resonate more than others.  Burt Bacharach's Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head is very much a sign of the times the movie it was made, but it isn't as bad as some critics make it out.  It's all part of the generally light-hearted, comedic tone of the movie.  A great extended sequence that runs almost a full half hour as Butch and Sundance running from a faceless posse we never seen in close-up, continually asking 'Who are those guys?, leading up to the infamous, hysterical cliff exchange (watch HERE). But for all the comedy, there's emotion here, including one of my favorites as the duo takes jobs as payroll guards and are forced to shoot it out with a gang of Bolivian bandits.  Sundance's softly delivered line 'We went straight...now what?" says it all, and leads into the frustratingly depressing ending.

Stop reading if you don't want to know the ending SPOILERS Forced back to a life of robbing and stealing, Butch and Sundance get cornered in a small Bolivian mountain village.  Facing Bolivian police, they make a desperate grab for more ammunition only to have a company of Bolivian cavalry arrive to help the police.  With nowhere to go and not knowing what awaits them outside, Butch and Sundance go out in a blaze of glory, charging into a wall of gunfire.  I've read that their deaths were actually filmed (or so I've heard), but thankfully Goldman uses a freeze frame instead, and it's a wise decision.  As a viewer, we like these characters too much to see them go out like Bonnie and Clyde or The Wild Bunch.  The gunfight leading up to the finale is a doozy (watch it HERE) and worth mentioning in its own right. The ending of course isn't a happy one, but it's a necessary one.  Still, it's hard either way.  There's a moment where Sundance steps out into the open over a wounded Butch to protect him that says everything about these two men. Friends till the end.

So can you tell I like this movie?  Yeah, me neither.  As a western fan, I'm a sucker for just about anything, but Butch and Sundance is a step above.  Newman and Redford have never been better, and together they are perfect.  In the supporting cast look for Strother Martin as Percy Garrett, a "colorful" mine owner, Jeff Corey as a sheriff who delivers a speech that predicts what awaits Butch and Sundance, and Cloris Leachman as Dolores, a hooker with an eye on Butch. I don't say it often, but one of those few perfect movies.

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid <---trailer (1969): ****/****

Conagher

Growing up, I became a reader at a young age, and I'd read just about anything having to do with the old west.  Fiction and non-fiction, novels, short stories or encyclopedias, they were all the same to me.  The master of the western story, Louis L'Amour, obviously appealed a lot to me, and I still remember the first book of his I read, The First Fast Draw.  I still read his books from time to time because above all else, they're the literary equivalent of comfort food.  You know what you're getting each time you open one of his books.

In the last few months, I've reviewed several L'Amour ventures into movies, made for TV movies and even TV shows.  Unlike bigger scale westerns where the scale was important, L'Amour's novels never had that problem.  They usually focused on a handful of main characters instead of hundreds of speaking parts and were about the problems of those individuals rather than a bigger western where a whole town or territory might be in danger.  So with that thought, maybe Louis L'Amour and his novels were cut out for made-for-TV movies where the smaller scale was a benefit, not a hindrance.  Not one of the best examples but a decent enough western, 1991's Conagher.

Traveling west with her recently married husband and his two kids from his previous marriage, Evie Teale (Katharine Ross) finds herself running the homestead by herself in unforgiving territory.  Her husband went to buy cattle and has been missing for months, leaving her to believe he died somehow because he wouldn't just abandon his family.  But Evie trudges on, living the toughest of frontier lives from day to day.  A drifting cowboy, Conn Conagher (Sam Elliott), stops by one day on the trail and helps out briefly before moving on.  There is a connection immediately between Evie and Conn, but they seem almost fated not to be together. But trying to carve out a living on their own, the two similar minded people can't help but be drawn to each other.

Some actors are cut out for certain genres, and Sam Elliott belongs in westerns, plain and simple.  He has the look and the acting style that fits in perfectly with the genre.  More than that, he's cut out to play a L'Amour hero, hard-working, tough, always willing to help, and honest/loyal to a fault.  Basically, he's a man of principle.  This was Elliott's fourth appearance in a movie based off a L'Amour novel, and he's got the part down to an art by now.  His performance is the best part of the movie, and the story tends to drag when he's not around.  It drags some even when he is around, but that's not entirely his fault.

Now I haven't read Conagher so I may be criticizing the movie more than I am the book here.  At 117 minutes, this feels too disjointed without any unifying connection through the story.  There are these little episodic sidebars that reveal more about the character but never anything surprising.  Conagher signs on with an old rancher (Ken Curtis in a solid supporting turn) who is being run out by a rival ranch.  These scenes show Conn's willingness to do what's right when it'd be easier to bail, but that's nothing we didn't know already. Then to add insult to injury, this drifter cowboy must tangle with two rustlers (James Gammon and Paul Koslo).  Streamline the story some and these segments are gone for an overall more well organized story.   

It isn't often I'm about to say this, but this is a western that could have used more of the romantic subplot that it introduces but doesn't do anything with until the end.  Married in real life, Elliott and Ross have an obvious chemistry together without much in the way of words spoken.  After a brief scene early where they meet, they spend most of the rest of the movie apart.  Maybe I was just expecting something different from the story where they meet early, fall for each other and go from there, but I was disappointed in how the relationship developed.  Basically they spend too much time apart in the slow-moving middle sections that don't do much anyways.

The rest of the cast is solid for a TV western.  Barry Corbin is the best part as McCloud, the stagecoach driver who frequents the Teale's place. Billy Green Bush appears very briefly as Jacob, Evie's husband, with Gavan O'Herlihy making a reliably evil bad guy.  Also look for recognizable western faces Buck Taylor as a rival cowboy and Dub Taylor as a stagecoach station agent.  It's a decent enough western, but other than Elliott and Ross I'm remembering little to recommend.  Average in every way and probably only for western completists.

Conagher <---trailer (1991): **/****

Hellfighters

After years of chain smoking, John Wayne underwent surgery to remove his cancerous left lung in 1964.  A huge star since he burst onto the scene in the 1930s, the Duke came back with a vengeance and over the next 15 years made 20 movies.  With an exception here and there, these movies were typically family affairs for Wayne.  He worked with directors, crews, and actors that were familiar with him.  And in this period more than any other, John Wayne didn't even have to act because most of the time he was playing himself. 

Going through such a drastic procedure clearly didn't slow him down, but it certainly made the star appreciate what he had.  Why mess with productions that would only threaten his health again?  Instead, he stuck with what he knew.  And of those 20 movies, I can name several which are in my top 10 Duke movies.  One that isn't?  That's easy, 1968's Hellfighters.  I don't remember how old I was when I saw my first John Wayne movie, but I know I was young, and in the years since, I've seen just about every single one.  Hellfighters was one of the few I hadn't, and to be honest, I don't know why.  I never intentionally avoided it, but I never sought it out either.  I'm glad I saw it to check it off the list, but it's not one of Wayne's better efforts.

John Wayne plays Chance Buckman, the owner of a company that puts out oil well fires.  Buckman's exploits are based loosely on real life firefighter Red Adair, but reading up about Adair, it looks like the only thing the movie and his life have in common is that they were both actually oil well firefighters.  It's about there the similarities diverge in a big way.  In terms of pure visual entertainment and spectacle, I'm hard-pressed to think of too many things more exciting to watch than an epic, blazing oil well fire.  These scenes are the high points of the movie.  But somehow and for some reason, the story is dumbed down and filtered to the point where it could be any dangerous profession.  So instead of 2 hours of fighting oil well fires, we get unnecessary family drama.

Chance Buckman (Wayne) loves what he does and he's damn good at it.  With his company based out of Houston, Buckman travels the world with his team putting out, extinguishing and saving oil wells that burst into flames during drilling.  It's incredibly dangerous work, but with years of practice and know-how, Chance has got it down to an art.  But after one accident that hospitalizes him, his estranged daughter, Tish (Katharine Ross), comes to see him and ends up marrying Chance's right-hand man, Greg Parker (Jim Hutton). As if his job wasn't worrisome enough, Chance is now worrying about his daughter and son-in-law, not to mention his divorced wife, Madelyn (Vera Miles), who returns after years away. 

It almost pains me to right that specific of a plot description for a movie about oil well firefighters.  And that's the unfortunate part.  With a profession like this, you would think it nearly impossible to make a dull movie about it, but director Andrew V. McLaglen succeeds in a big way.  The minute the story heads away from the fire scenes, Hellfighters is downright dull.  I'll admit some of the family background is needed to show the effects the job has on the firefighter and their families, but a little goes a long way here.  Ross especially seems to get a kick out of showing up at these dangerous sites, seemingly oblivious to that danger.  Wayne and Hutton spend much of the movie yelling at her to get down or get back.  Her character is annoying and not in a cutesy way.

These romantic scenes are at times painful to watch.  Wayne worked with Vera Miles in several pictures, but never with a romantic dynamic between them.  As divorcees, they have little chemistry together, and it seems an odd choice to make 60-year old Wayne a heartthrob with this part.  As annoying as the Hutton/Ross love plotline can be, at least it's somewhat believable.  Not so with an older Wayne and a 39-year old Miles.  Still, Wayne is the Duke, and he does make the most of his part, instilling some humor and 'Never say die!' spirit into it.  Hutton is wasted as Chance's right hand man which is disappointing because as was the case with The Green Berets, he's got good chemistry with Wayne.

I'm not able to find clips available of the oil well scenes, but they're a sight to behold with a feeling of 'I know I shouldn't look, but I must!' throughout.  Now whether McLaglen filmed actual oil well fires or created his own for the sake of the movie, I don't know, but these are some remarkable sequences.  Making them that much cooler, Wayne and Hutton look to do at least some of their own stunts nearby the flaming wells.  Wayne's team includes Bruce Cabot and Edward Faulkner as on-site help, with old friend and partner Jay C. Flippen left behind back at the office.  It's too bad more couldn't have been done with the team because I found them much more interesting.  Two solid hours of fighting oil fires probably isn't feasible, but cut the movie by 30 minutes, and maybe we're onto something.

All I can say is I wish this was a better movie.  There's only so many John Wayne movies out there so when I see one that doesn't live up to its potential, I feel like I'm missing out.  Hellfighters has a lot of potential but never lives up to it.  Lots of great sequences are there with a solid cast, but it never clicks together.  The story drifts along filling in the blanks between fires before the necessary, not at all surprising ending.  Worthwhile for the oil well fire sequences, but other than that, steer clear.

Hellfighters <----fan-made trailer (1968): **/****

The Final Countdown

A whole sub-genre of history/sci-fi has been devoted to one idea; using variations of time travel, if you could change history, would you? Imagine going back to November 1963 and being in the Dallas Book Depository and stopping Lee Harvey Oswald from shooting John F. Kennedy JR. Think of going back even further and killing a young Adolf Hitler. That's just two examples, but the obvious follow-up is this...how could changing one person's life affect millions of others? So goes 1980's The Final Countdown.

It's 1979 and defense contractor Warren Lasky (Martin Sheen) has been chosen to take an advisory trip on the U.S.S. Nimitz, a US Navy nuclear carrier stationed in the Pacific. On board, Capt. Yelland (Kirk Douglas) welcomes Lasky and offers to help in any way he can. Others, like Wing Commander Owens (James Farentino), aren't so convinced Lasky's there to help. All personal grudges are thrown to the curb when the Nimitz sails into a horrific storm unlike anyone onboard has ever been through. On the other side of the storm, everything seems to be okay. The carrier can move as quickly as ever, all weapons and communications systems still work, and the crew is all right.

But something's not quite right. The radio is broadcasting Jack Benny shows, the radio frequencies and codes are years past their usefulness, and oddly enough, Japanese fighter planes are seen in the vicinity. Lasky, Yelland and crew figure it out; the Nimitz has somehow traveled back in time. It's December 6, 1941, just hours before the Japanese sneak attack on Pearl Harbor. The debate starts immediately as to what they should do, intervene and prevent the attack and change history or do nothing and let America's involvement in WWII come to fruition?

Time travel is about as complicated as anything presented in science fiction. Shows like Lost and Flash Forward and countless movies have dealt with the subject with all it's little wrinkles and differences. Sheen's Lasky wonders aloud 'if we stop the attack and therefore stop America in WWII, do we cease to exist because the line of time that caused us to be there is now altered?' It's the type of conversation that hurts your head just thinking about it and all the possibilities. But that's the fun of the premise; what if?

The build-up and the mounting clues as Yelland tries to figure out what is going on are the high points of the movie. The problem is in the final 30 minutes as Yelland makes his decision on what to do with his attack force of almost 100 modern jet fighters. The problem? It's a cop out ending. There is no ending. Recently, Quentin Tarantino rewrote history with his Inglourious Basterds, and I found myself wishing 'Countdown' did that too. But it doesn't, settling for an ending that makes sense but doesn't do anything risky. It's a safe decision, and unfortunately one that brings the movie down a notch. There is a worthwhile twist in the final scene, but not one to steer the movie back on course.

A positive to take away is the casting with veteran star Kirk Douglas taking the lead as Capt. Yelland, the commander of the USS Nimitz. Yelland must decide what to do in a situation no Navy officer ever figured on having to do, change history or follow orders. Sheen gets the more showy part as Lasky, the defense contractor always looking for alternatives. It's his character that believes with one fell swoop the whole timeline of history could be altered for the better. Farentino is also good as Owens, the amateur historian and expert fighter pilot. Charles Durning and Katharine Ross play Senator Samuel Chapman and his aide Laurel who living in 1941 become the unwilling participants aboard a time-traveling carrier. Ron O'Neal is also good as Cmdr. Thurman, Yelland's right hand man.

This is a science fiction story ripe with potential that never really delivers in the end. Too bad because even with a disappointing ending, 'Countdown' is still a movie I'd recommend because the premise is so interesting and out of the box of normal movie storytelling. Good cast, especially Douglas and Sheen, and some great footage aboard an immense US carrier. Dated special effects be damned, this one is still worth seeing.

The Final Countdown <----trailer (1980): ** 1/2 /****