Old classic with a funny twist

[CaptainCrunch]

I'm on vacation for the christmas week, and just got back from shopping to turn on the idiot tube to channel 46 which shows classic movies.

One of my favorite cold war movies is playing which is Ice Station Zero starring Rock Hudson and Ernest Borgnine, about a nuclear sub going under the ice caps to reach a northern station with marines on board, and a english spy. There is also the concern that there is an enemy sabateur on board trying to scuttle the mission.

If your into movies with a lot of technical accuracy, this movie is pretty accurate in the operation of nuclear submarines.

Anyways, about half way through the movie, it pauses with a picture of the submarine, and the word Intermission in bold on the screen with some music. Then the word intermission is translated into french.

Its actually pretty funny to watch as the intermission went for 5 minutes with no commercial break from the T.V. Station.

Useless thread, sure, but its nice to see a movie on T.V. presented the way it was probably done in the theatre.

[Looger]

saw this flick years ago, then when popular science had that huge post-cold-war spread on 'ice station X' i remembered that movie and tried to figure out how real some of it could be.

[CaptainCrunch]

Well, we don't know alot about bases like CFB alert, the Canadian Forces base in the arctic, and exactly what they do up there. During the cold war, the rumor was that Canada stored nukes up there. We do know that its not one of the favorite postings for soldiers.

On the movie, a lot of it was technically accurate, and probably a little ahead of its time.

There were some pretty funny errors in the movie for any submariners who watched it.

The American submarine in the movie looks like it was based on the skipjack class, yet unlike the skipjack class this boat had twin screws which were based on the George washington class boats.

The use of radar while the boat was submerged was funny at best.

The crewman opens the reactor vessel to show the Russian how a nuc sub works. Of course this would have probably killed the crew.

Other then that it was a movie with significant accuracy.

[Azure]

I loved the book....haven't see the movie though.

[Cowperson]

The book "Ice Station Zebra" is vastly superior to the movie if you ask me . . . . .

Alistair MacLean was one of my favourite thriller authors at one time.

HMS Ulysses was his first novel, loosely based on his experiences on a destroyer doing convoy duty to Russia in the 1940's.

Other well known movies you might recognize would be "Where Eagles Dare (Richard Burton and Clint Eastwood)," "The Guns Of Navarone," "Puppet On A Chain" and "Breakheart Pass" and, I think, "When Eight Bells Toll"

Later in his career, when his quality wasn't as good, he also wrote a mystery novel set in the Athabasca tar sands.

It's the books that were written in the 50's, 60's and 70's though, which were consistently great but he lost something and his writing became pretty formulaic through the later 70's and beyond.

The names above plus "Fear Is The Key," "Night Without End," "Bear Island" and "The Last Frontier" were also fun to read.

You could always count on the villian, just prior to some diabolical deed, coming forth with the very civilized: "My dear Adrianna . . ."

A good link:

http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/m/alistair-maclean/

You can probably find a lot of those in the library or old book stores.

Cowperson