This was an eerie one to watch due to how accurately it depicts our future over 60 years ago, if for a different reason.
Directed by Val Guest, this is a classic grounded hard sci-fi, like something you'd read out of an Analog Magazine of the era. The dialog is surprisingly snappy and well written, and the special effects are quite well done, if used sparingly. The acting is pretty damn solid as well. It's filmed in a fairly unique style in the way it flows, and while a slow burn with little action, I found the writing and concept compelling.
The story centers around a down-and-out British journalist for the Daily Express, Peter Stenning. Struggling to finish a story and constantly being bailed out by his friend, a new lead on strange happenings by the US and USSR sets him on the path to be able to write the story of a lifetime, certainly front page material, at least.
This was a labor of love by the director, who had to beg and plead to multiple studios before one finally gave him a modest budget to get it made, and I think he did a pretty fantastic job. Rotten Tomatoes seems to agree, as it received a rating of 86% there.
This film covers a pretty broad set of themes, including:
- News Media
- Social Class
- Gender Politics (for the 60's, anyway)
- And a couple other things that would spoil the story :)
If that sounds interesting, I highly recommend it. I came away from it being pretty darn satisfied and impressed.
I tried opening directly from the link with an external browser on mobile. I'm using the connect app unfortunately it didn't work but I mostly commented so I'd remember to watch this later when I wasn't at work seems to load fine on desktop firefox