THE DAY THE EARTH CAUGHT FIRE

UK, 1961, 99 Minutes, Black and white.
Edward Judd, Janet Munro, Leo Mc Kern, Michael Goodliffe.
Directed by Val Guest.

The Day the Earth Caught Fire is very interesting and even frightening British science fiction of the early 60s. Photographed in black and white, it used coloured filters, especially at the end to suggest the final doom. The film focuses on nuclear tests and the possibility of the world moving off its axis and rushing towards the sun. The framework of the story is newspaper reporting and so there is a continued commentary on the action, the scientists' attempt to correct the situation and the human drama.

Novelist Wolf Mankowitz has written an interesting screenplay in collaboration with director Val Guest. The film has a strong British supporting cast and makes it overall persuasive and interesting science fiction entertainment.

1 Wat do audiences expect from science-fiction films? Reality and fantasy? Speculation about the future? Insight into human nature in crisis? Fear? Imagining the world and its future? The worst? Learning?

2. How strong was the didactic purpose in this film? How well was it Integrated into the entertainment? Was the film really entertaining?

3. The validity of the nuclear warning? As at the beginning of the 60s? Now? nuclear warnings and human fear? How well were these Illustrated?

4. Comment on the techniques used: the black and white photography, the starkness of the Incidents, the documentary style with the newspaper, the alternatives at the end, the^ tinting of the screen?

5. How important for the film was the flavour of the newspaper world - as an anchor for reality, documentary, the style of the people and the work of the paper, the locations and authenticity, the editors? Bill Maguire as seeming authentic - and his response to the nuclear threats? His attitudes towards life and work and the future? The contrast with Stenning and his attitudes?

6. The presentation of newspaper ethics in crisis? Newspapers as giving news, not creating panic, speculating, Influencing public opinion, influencing authorities? Stenning and his stances towards newspaper ethics? Maguire and his ethics? The two headlines at the end?

7. How suitable a hero for this film was Stenning? Was he too pessimistic? A man at the end of the world? His marriage and his son? Why did he begin the affair? His using of Jeannie for information? His cynicism? How did the crisis bring out from him some human values?

8. Was Jeannie an attractive heroine? A heroine at the end of the world?

9. Audience response to the boy, the sequences of him at play, his attitude towards his father? A boy at the end of the world?

10. How well did the film contrast ordinary life and then the panic sequences?

11. The portrayal of the heat, the park sequences, the Irregularities and their effect on people's lives?

12. How interesting was the solution proposed? The risks for the world? MM there any alternative?

13. Was this film really entertaining or was it too apocalyptic?

14. Does science-fiction like this have a perennial value or does it seem past now?