Special Bulletin (1983) (TV)

Director:

Edward Zwick

Writers:

Marshall Herskovitz (screenplay)
Marshall Herskovitz (story) ...

Release Date:

20 March 1983 (USA)

Genre:

Drama

Plot:

A TV reporter and cameraman are taken hostage on a tugboat while covering a workers strike. The demands...

Plot Keywords:

Nuclear | Terrorism | News Report | Fake News Report | Nuclear Weapons

Awards:

Won 4 Primetime Emmys. Another 3 wins & 2 nominations

Cast

Ed Flanders	...	John Woodley
Kathryn Walker	...	Susan Myles
Roxanne Hart	...	Megan 'Meg' Barclay
Christopher Allport	...	Steven Levitt
David Clennon	...	Dr. Bruce Lyman
David Rasche	...	Dr. David McKeeson
Rosalind Cash	...	Frieda Barton
Ebbe Roe Smith	...	Jim Seaver
Roberta Maxwell	...	Diane Silverman
Robert Kay	...	George Takashima
J. Wesley Huston	...	Bernard Frost
Frank Dent	...	Dr. Jason Halpern
Charles Lanyer	...	Merritt Cunningham
Mie Hunt	...	Ellen Stevens
Bruce Fields	...	Walter S. Letteau

Runtime:

103 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Company:

National Broadcasting Company (NBC)

Trivia:

When this film was first broadcast, the network superimposed the word "dramatization" on the bottom of the screen every few minutes and ran disclaimers after every commercial break, to remind people it was only a movie. That didn't stop some people in Charleston, S.C. from panicking anyway.

Goofs:

Revealing mistakes: The bomb goes off and the screen goes to static. In actuality, the countdown clock (still counting down) and the lower third box would still be on the screen (the lower third box would have static though,) as it is coming from the network's control room (in New York) instead of Charleston, and would not have been affected by the blast.

Quotes:

John Woodley: Is it possible to compare the weapons deployed today, the kind of the Russians may have aimed at Charleston with what the terrorists have on that ship?
Arlen Surrey: John, tonight, people who are 5 miles from the harbor would survive the blast at least. If a Soviet 1 megaton bomb was dropped on the harbor, those people, 5 miles away, would be vaporized in the first three-fifths of a second.

Dated, but still powerful. Try it, you'll like it!

Although the time period and the technological limitations of early 80s tele-journalism are enough to clearly date this film as a relic, it was still highly enjoyable to watch, and I am still overpowered each time I watch it.

I had the good fortune to see this film when it was originally broadcast. And as soon as I saw the opening break-in to the fictional "RBS" television network, I knew I was witnessing an eerie, modern-day equivalent of the "War of the Worlds" scare of the 1930s.

As I watch it today, I still feel the cold shivers, even while watching Ed Flanders of "St. Elsewhere" verbally duking it out with David Rasche of TV's "Sledge Hammer".

Okay, many of the actors are clearly that - actors. Many of the "facts" about nuclear annihilation are in fact watered down. (Sorry, the cameras and video recorders would not still be working due to the severe electromagnetic pulse delivered by a nuclear blast. So there would be no way to rewind the tape and do a playback.)

Yet the issues given voice here are as poignant today as they were almost twenty years ago. We still stand on the brink, as the Chinese hold pilots of a downed US spy plane hostage, even while the Russians (no longer Soviet) trade barbs and spy accusations with our government. Add the dangerous political instability in the Middle East, Bosnia, Chechnya, political unrest in many parts of Africa and South America, and shake well. And Timothy McVeigh clearly indicated that not all of our enemies come from foreign nations. No, the Cold War did not end - someone just moved the air conditioner on us.

In many ways, "Special Bulletin" COULD have and SHOULD have had the same impact as "The Day After", shown later that same year. Probably because of the news-media backlash (Remember, some of this film does not paint television journalists in a favorable light), it was not given nearly the marketing blitz that accompanied that other film.

"Special Bulletin" remains a chilling, yet mostly forgotten piece of Cold War heritage. Take this film for what it strives to be - a warning about what could happen and how we as a nation could react to the unthinkable...