Review: The Final Countdown

Captained by Kirk Douglas, an American aircraft carrier departing from Pearl Harbour gets caught in an unusual storm. Afterwards, they find they are unable to pick up any comms signals outside of outdated radio broadcasts and wartime coded messages. Further investigations reveal that ships that were destroyed during WWII are still out there in the ocean in the exact same location they were in the war. Yep, they’ve travelled back in time to 1941. What to do? And how in the hell will they get out of the 1940s and back to the present day? Martin Sheen plays a systems analyst on board the ship to observe its functionality. James Farentino and Ron O’Neal play Commanders, Charles Durning is a 1940s Senator, Katharine Ross plays the Senator’s aide, and Soon-Tek Oh plays a feisty downed Japanese pilot.

 

Perhaps if I hadn’t seen “The Philadelphia Experiment” (both versions) before this 1980 film from director Don Taylor (“Five Man Army”, “Escape From the Planet of the Apes”) I might’ve liked it a bit better. But I did and I don’t. A mixture of Irwin Allen disaster movie and sci-fi you keep wondering why you’re not enjoying it much, it seems like a can’t miss. Unfortunately in Taylor’s workman-like hands it’s a bit dull and flat, with only Martin Sheen’s rock-solid performance and a good music score by John Scott (“Wake in Fright”, “Wrong Bet”) to keep you awake.

 

It’s too slow, 40 minutes in and the characters are only now figuring out what we figured out 15 minutes prior at the very latest. Even when they do, the film never really goes anywhere. It’s ‘Golly gee, we’re in 1941!’ over and over. Great, yes you’re in 1941. Now go somewhere with that. But the film never really does. Also, the Maurice Binder FX are a mistake. They look exactly of the quality of his early Bond title designs. He’s a great title designer, but phony as hell in visual FX work and it undermines the film. The film also wastes the talented Charles Durning and Katharine Ross, whilst Kirk Douglas is just collecting a pay check here. Worst of all is Ron O’Neal. He was terrific in “Superfly” but here he’s awful and stilted. Is this indicative of a bad performance or an actor who isn’t interested in the material? Perhaps both, but either way the man was much more capable than what he shows here.

 

World War II buffs with a side interest in time travel might find something in this slow-moving affair, but I was struggling. I think it’s dull and rather too pleased with its premise at the expense of being interested in the characters. When the film arrives at its ending, you wonder what the hell the point of it all was. It’s a total cop-out to say the least. No, this one isn’t satisfactory at all. The screenplay is by Gerry Davis (creator of TV’s “Doomwatch”), David Ambrose (“The Survivor”, “D.A.R.Y.L.”), Peter Powell (who died the same year the film was released), and Thomas Hunter (more productive as an actor in “Anzio”, “The Vampire Happening” and “The Cassandra Crossing”), from a story by the latter three.

 

Rating: C