Phew! What a scorcher!
One positive side-effect of the heatwave was to remind me that I had a copy of the film The Day The Earth Caught Fire, so I watched it yesterday feeling it kind of apt that it was the day Britain hit a record temperature, I'd be watching a film where it would be regarded as a wonderfully cool day.
It's one of those classic, and now almost forgotten, British films that we used to produce regularly up until the 1960s but now only seem to be able to do every few years, if at all, making it a sad reminder of the decline of our film industry. It also fits in with the rather British form of SF, not least because it was written and directed by Val Guest, who had been responsible for the first two Quatermass films, but it also has a similar feel to the novels of John Wyndham, especially The Kraken Wakes with its particularly British response to global catastrophe and it's telling of the the story through the eyes of reporters (a trend that's continued in 'global disaster' movies right through to the more recent Deep Impact).
The Day The Earth Caught Fire offers a rather unique turn on the nuclear paranoia of the late 50s and 60s. Unknowingly, the Americans and Soviets have conducted simultaneous tests of the two largest nuclear devices ever built at opposite ends of the world. Freak weather conditions are happening across the globe - monsoons in London, snowstorms in New York, cyclones in the Mediterranean - with no explanation available.
It would be an easy story to tell in classic disaster movie mould - lots of shots of the affected areas, then various scenes of scientists meeting with Presidents and Prime Ministers etc etc but Guest (and co-writer Wolf Mankowitz) instead give it to us from the perspective of Daily Express reporter Peter Stenning (played by Edward Judd). At the start, Stenning is almost the stereotype of the washed-up journalist - an embittered, divorced alcoholic, uninterested in his job (and almost all of life) and only keeping his position on the Express thanks to the efforts of his friend and fellow journalist, Bill Mcguire (an excellent performance by Leo McKern). The story is as much about Stenning's redemption, catalysed by his relationship with Janet Munro's Jeannie, as it is about the disaster that is about to befall the Earth.
It's through Jeannie, who works as a secretary at the Met Office, that Stenning is given both his personal and professional redemption. She discovers that the explosions have not just affected the Earth's weather patterns - they've shifted the planet's axis, a result that's is probably impossible in the real world but her, in line with the rest of the film, it's presented so credibly that you do believe it, or at least you suspend your disbelief, even when it's announced that the shift has knocked Earth out of its orbit, pushing it towards the Sun.
What makes it such a good film, though, is that it takes what could have just been a melodramatic disaster movie and instead produces a superbly written and acted character piece, letting their emotions persuade us that the end of the world is possible. Judd and Munro both put in fine performances, he making Stenning's despair and comeback understandable, she turning Jeannie into more than the screaming wallflower women often become in these films - considering it was made in 1961, her actions (including the slap she gives Stenning on their first meeting) are rather ahead of their times. It's McKern, though, who almost steals the films from the others, partially because the script gives him some of the best lines - 'We've got about four months before there's a delightful smell in the universe of charcoaled mankind.' is a particular favourite - but also because he brings such relish to the role of a Fleet Street hack finally given a big story, perhaps the biggest story ever, to report.
One final touch that elevates the film is that the newspaper scenes were produced in collaboration with the Daily Express - some of its staff actuall appear in the film as editors and the like - and you feel that you're watching a real newspaper in action with all it's jargon and foibles rather than the sanitised and smoothed out version of the media you often see in films.
In short, it's a film well worth watching, even if the thunderstorm that's passed over as I've written this signals the end of the heatwave. It's occasionally on TV (my video comes from what I believe was the last time it was broadcast, in 1999) and it's also available on a rather well-reviewed DVD.
It's one of those classic, and now almost forgotten, British films that we used to produce regularly up until the 1960s but now only seem to be able to do every few years, if at all, making it a sad reminder of the decline of our film industry. It also fits in with the rather British form of SF, not least because it was written and directed by Val Guest, who had been responsible for the first two Quatermass films, but it also has a similar feel to the novels of John Wyndham, especially The Kraken Wakes with its particularly British response to global catastrophe and it's telling of the the story through the eyes of reporters (a trend that's continued in 'global disaster' movies right through to the more recent Deep Impact).
The Day The Earth Caught Fire offers a rather unique turn on the nuclear paranoia of the late 50s and 60s. Unknowingly, the Americans and Soviets have conducted simultaneous tests of the two largest nuclear devices ever built at opposite ends of the world. Freak weather conditions are happening across the globe - monsoons in London, snowstorms in New York, cyclones in the Mediterranean - with no explanation available.
It would be an easy story to tell in classic disaster movie mould - lots of shots of the affected areas, then various scenes of scientists meeting with Presidents and Prime Ministers etc etc but Guest (and co-writer Wolf Mankowitz) instead give it to us from the perspective of Daily Express reporter Peter Stenning (played by Edward Judd). At the start, Stenning is almost the stereotype of the washed-up journalist - an embittered, divorced alcoholic, uninterested in his job (and almost all of life) and only keeping his position on the Express thanks to the efforts of his friend and fellow journalist, Bill Mcguire (an excellent performance by Leo McKern). The story is as much about Stenning's redemption, catalysed by his relationship with Janet Munro's Jeannie, as it is about the disaster that is about to befall the Earth.
It's through Jeannie, who works as a secretary at the Met Office, that Stenning is given both his personal and professional redemption. She discovers that the explosions have not just affected the Earth's weather patterns - they've shifted the planet's axis, a result that's is probably impossible in the real world but her, in line with the rest of the film, it's presented so credibly that you do believe it, or at least you suspend your disbelief, even when it's announced that the shift has knocked Earth out of its orbit, pushing it towards the Sun.
What makes it such a good film, though, is that it takes what could have just been a melodramatic disaster movie and instead produces a superbly written and acted character piece, letting their emotions persuade us that the end of the world is possible. Judd and Munro both put in fine performances, he making Stenning's despair and comeback understandable, she turning Jeannie into more than the screaming wallflower women often become in these films - considering it was made in 1961, her actions (including the slap she gives Stenning on their first meeting) are rather ahead of their times. It's McKern, though, who almost steals the films from the others, partially because the script gives him some of the best lines - 'We've got about four months before there's a delightful smell in the universe of charcoaled mankind.' is a particular favourite - but also because he brings such relish to the role of a Fleet Street hack finally given a big story, perhaps the biggest story ever, to report.
One final touch that elevates the film is that the newspaper scenes were produced in collaboration with the Daily Express - some of its staff actuall appear in the film as editors and the like - and you feel that you're watching a real newspaper in action with all it's jargon and foibles rather than the sanitised and smoothed out version of the media you often see in films.
In short, it's a film well worth watching, even if the thunderstorm that's passed over as I've written this signals the end of the heatwave. It's occasionally on TV (my video comes from what I believe was the last time it was broadcast, in 1999) and it's also available on a rather well-reviewed DVD.
Nick got away with this at 6:38 AM
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