This made for television movie is about the Soviet Union during the Cold War years attacking America with nuclear bombs. The cast is first rate with Emmy winners James Earl Jones and Powers Boothe along with Rebecca DeMornay, Martin Landau, Rip Torn, Darren McGavin, Peter McNichol, Nicolas Coaster, Daniel Benzali, and others. The film is outdated now sincere Cold War has been over for some time. The film shows the fear of nuclear attacks during the Cold War. The film shows the possibility of life and terror. I didn't get the ending of the film at all as to what really happened to the planes. They do give you final notes about what was going on. Thank God, it's not based on reality.

It's rather like "Fail Safe" except that this time it's some renegade group of Russian rebels who launches a missile at a Russian target. The Russian defense system launches its missiles automatically in the direction of American targets. Boom -- and it hits the fan. Communications are cut off. Cities are blasted. The president's helicopter is downed. Control of American war gear and war policy is now turned over to the semi-conscious Secretary of the Interior, who's first question of his advisers is, "Are we losing?" (As if there will be a winner and a loser, as in a high school football game.) Thereafter, it gets complicated. It's fast paced. No time is wasted on personality or reality intrusions, except for the first few minutes, when Powers Boothe as the pilot of a problematic B-52 falls drunkenly into bed with his girl friend and co-pilot, Rebecca DeMornay. There must be a romance between a pilot and a female staff member or it's not an airplane movie.There are -- let me think -- there are two fist fights, three drawn pistols, two premature ejections, one bitch slap, one mid-air collision, one rude Russian premier, one and a half blindings, and a handful of thermonuclear bombs.It's taut. How could it not be? It's another movie about the accidental attack of one nuclear power on another, and the subsequent attempts to call the whole thing off. But it's not "Fail Safe" or "Doctor Strangelove"; it's a commercial product. The characters aren't uninteresting and they show the kind of diversity required for a movie like this. But they stay the same throughout.The novel, I would guess, is more accessible because in a book you have time to stretch things out -- get to know the people and their milieu. A movie is by nature more concise. It must leave things out. This film is marred by so many lacunae that it left me confused enough that the climax came as a complete surprise. Maybe I'm just dumb. That's what my friends keep telling me -- my former friends, anyway.If you want to see a serious dramatic film about a subject like this, do watch "Fail Safe." If you want to watch a masterpiece, try "Dr. Strangelove."

Quite a good movie considering the fact that it appears to me to be a low budget film. I like films that hit upon this theme of Nuclear Warfare. This is a serious Dr Strangelove. For those of you that like this kind of movie though I would recommend "Threads" which I definitely prefer, it brings us the situation from the people's experience whereas this gets the political situation and military situation. Someone, we are not entirely sure who, drops a nuclear bomb and The Soviet Union who immediately blame the states by hitting back and then so on and so forth, how are we going to end it type of thing. there are some parts though which are utterly non convincing like the way the president survives and his poor acting, and also the pilot on a mission to blow a civilization with his loving girlfriend as co pilot.

As a former nuclear submariner, I'm frequently annoyed when the producers of military movies just make stuff up in the name of dramatic expediency. I can also overcome this annoyance when the dramatic aspect of the film is worth expediting. Shoving in authentic military lingo can get in the way on occasion. This film was poorly researched, poorly acted, poorly written and poorly directed. It was a pure bruckheimer-esquire hack job whose only redeeming quality is its short running time. Everyone associated with this film should be ashamed. Their families should be ashamed. I can't believe this film got a higher rating than 'The Day After'. At least 'The Day After' was well researched, even if the acting was spotty.How you can take a dramatic theme like an ongoing nuclear standoff, great actors like James Earl Jones and still end up with a giant piece of garbage so lame that calling it hackneyed melodramatic drivel is far too generous a complement. If I ever meet Mr. Sholder, the director of this film, I will simply turn away and mutter to my doting family 'that man is dead to me.'