FAILSAFE

US, 1964, 102 minutes, Black and white.
Henry Fonda, Dan O' Herlihy, Walter Matthau, Larry Hagman, Fritz Weaver.
Directed by Sidney Lumet.

Failsafe came in 1964 in the aftermath of the Cuba confrontation and the fear of nuclear war. It must have been alarming in its time. Burdick and Wheeler's novel was a best seller and fitted in with the contemporary Seven Days in May. At the same time, the first of the black comedies on war appeared, the Failsafe story done in satirical tones. Dr. Strangelove: or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb. Nuclear fear films and war satire have developed since then.

Failsafe is a fairly straight-forward film and effective thriller. Henry Fonda gives one of his sturdy performances as the President. Walter Matthau is somewhat heavy-handed as the militaristic adviser.

Director Sidney Lumet has made many telling films like Twelve Angry Men, The Pawnbroker. After a lull in popularity in the late 60's he re-emerged with Serpico in 1973. Failsafe cannot fail to offer many discussion points.

1. Did you like this film? Why? Was it real or was it a fantasy? Sou possible was it?

2. Comment on the atmosphere of the initial dream about the matador and the death of the bull. The atmosphere of premonition and its connection with the ending. How did this add to the impact of the film?

3. The technique of filming of one day only: of ordinary people, of ordinary situations, transformed by world disaster.

4. How did the film spend the first half building up an atmosphere for its crisis? Comment on General Black and the Black household. Black's attitude towards being a soldier, towards war, and towards Groetheschele. Groetheschele - his private life, his callousness, his attitudes, his attitudes and beliefs in war, his aggressive nature, his exploitation of situations, his fanatic anti-communism, his support of capitalist economics and industry, as a person and as an American? Comment also on the atmosphere built up by the lectures and the people listening to them, the visitors at Omaha and at Washington, the Senators, the industrial representatives, etc. The impact of discussions on war, the clashes of opinion, the need for peace-building or for war-building. Comment also on the life of the pilots and their human and inhuman reactions; and the fact that they were mechanised almost not to feel anything. How did this all prepare us for the film?

5. The way that the crisis itself was filmed - the people beginning to notice? Our gradual absorption into the crisis? What were the immediate reactions to the crisis? Were they predictable?

6. How well did the Americans cope with the crisis - the military people, the Secretary of State, the President himself? Do people react in this reassuring way in the worst of crises?

7. Comment on the President and his handling of the situation. What kind of person was the President - in himself, coping with the crisis, as a statesman and as a decision maker? His reliance on Buck for the interpretation of the Premier's voice and feelings? His reliance on the advice of Swensen and Bogan? His emotional response to the situation? The support given by Buck and their conversations as they waited for the phone? How important were the Presidential sequences for the impact of the film?

8. Swensen as an impassive adviser? Is this the best kind of adviser for such crises? Did Swensen give good advice?

9. Bogan as an old fashioned military man, yet able to give advice? Contrasting with Cascio who was a younger mafia, yet ambitious, nearer to breaking point than the others, and filled with an ambitious loyalty and so unable to give information to the Russians? Bogan's relationship with the Russians - especially at the end with the photo and the discussion about London? Contrasting with Cascio's breaking and his attempting to take over? (The Russians said that similar things had happened with them.)

10. Comment on the bargaining sequences and the interplay between the President and the Russian Premier with his advisers. Is this what would happen? What alternatives did each of the others have? Were the suspicions natural? Here the pledges necessary to be given? How else could one bargain?

11. The impact of the shooting down of the fighters and the enlisting of the Russians help to shoot down the American planes? Here these the right decisions? How difficult for the Americans? Were the lives of the pilots necessary for the safety of the world? Could any other decision have been made?

12. The impact of the full collaboration between the American and Russians, and the moral of this - that collaboration is possible and would have been preferable to such accidents and disasters? The inability of some on each side to communicate with the others - what does this say about brain-washing, convictions?

13. The sequences of the pilots in the planes, their skill in trying to get to their targets, their reactions which were meant to be unemotional, the sequence where Brady's wife speaks and pleads?

14. The importance of Moscow being the target. What impact does this have on audiences, especially when communism and communist countries are considered?

15. Were you shocked at the President's offer to bomb New York? Was this a proper choice and guarantee? What else could the President have done? What do you think would have been the audience reaction of those in New York in the mid-60's seeing this film?

16. Comment on the implications of the whole film - machines, computers, modern warfare, attitudes towards peace and towards war, human failure, mechanical failure, the fate of the world depending on such things? What is the world to do?

17. How dramatic was the ending? How successful for frightening people and for making the point?

18. Is this an important film as a record of the fears and tensions of the post-World War II years? Of the sixties?