The Final Countdown

Well, not quite, but always worth watching and listening to

For no particular reason, I wound up watching several movies that have at least a tangentil relationship to World War II in relatively close proximity. One that I watched because it sounded like it had a really interesting premise was The Final Countdown.

The movie starts off in 1980, which was the present day from the point of view of when the movie was released. Warren Lasky (Martin Sheen) works for Tideman Industries, a company that helped design the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz. He's about to board the Nimitz, sailing out of Pearl Harbor, in order to liaise with the Defense Department and figure out ways to make the operations of the ship run more efficiently and smoothly. Captaing the Nimitz is Capt. Matthew Yelland (Kirk Douglas).

The voyage runs relatively smoothly, at least until dark clouds appear on the horizon. Yelland is annoyed, largely because there was nothing in the weather forecast to indicate that they might be running into foul weather. But the weather continues to deteriorate, until some sort of odd lighted circle that looks like some sort of atmospheric vortex or the special effects for a wormhole shows up. The Nimitz is unable to avoid getting swallowed up by the vortex, but when they go through it they discover that the weather is fine on the other side.

Things also seem a little strange, since they can no longer contact Pearl Harbor. Cut to a yacht sailing out in the middle of the Pacific not far from Hawaii. This yacht is carrying prominent US Senator Samuel Chapman (Charles Durning), chariman of an equivalent of the Armed Services Committee. He's there with his executive secretary, Laurel Scott (Katharine Ross). Meanwhile, Yelland has sent a couple of planes to do reconnaissance, and the come up with some shocking photos: the memorial for the USS Arizona is no longer in Pearl Harbor where it's supposed to be.

Chapman knows, because he doesn't need to be told, not having gone through the vortex, that the date is December 6, 1941. In addition to being a Senator, he's considered a candidate to be nominated for Vice-President, since people close to Franklin Roosevelt were terrified by the views of then Vice-President Henry Wallace, which were even more Communist than the rest of the Roosevelt administration and were looking to replace Wallace on the 1944 ticket.

As it dawns on Yelland and the rest of the Nimitz crew what day it is, that they've traveled back in time, and what is supposed to happen the next day in the timeline they've entered, they face the conundrum of what to do. Obviously, there's a lot to be said for saving the lives of all those killed when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. But in that case, the Americans wouldn't have entered World War II and would have had to wait until much longer to get involved against Germany, which would have completely changed the course of the war in Europe.

Matters come to a head, considering that a couple of Japanese Zeros attack Chapman's yacht, and then a Japanese airman is among the survivors rescued from that attack by the Nimitz. The airman naturally tries to escape his newfound captivity, while Yelland tries to figure out a way to keep history right, never mind the fact that the Nimitz is not at war with the Japanese yet.

The Final Countdown is certainly an interesting premise, and one that the writers try to handle as intelligently as possible. When it comes to time-travel, however, especially when travelling to a past that's not only already happened but excedingly well known, that's going to be difficult. The resolution of the time-travel paradox is a bit of a mess that I don't want to reveal. But at least the rest of the movie is entertaining, and definitely worth a watch.