Seeing this again, 30 years later, I'm of two minds. There's still a lot to enjoy in this slightly Disney version of an end-of-the-world thriller. There's a lot of clever twists in the plot, some lovely performances, some real tension.
But it also all feels a bit light and softened to make it more audience friendly. That was probably the right decision commercially, but maybe not artistically. If original director Martin Brest had been allowed to finish the film, with the somewhat darker original script I read back then, I wonder if this could have been a bit of a minor classic, in the family of great nuclear war films like Dr. Strangelove and Fail Safe, instead of an entertaining, intelligent thrill ride. There are also, on reflection some big logic holes you could fly missiles through.
But at the end of the day, I still enjoyed re-seeing it, smiling a good deal of the time.
But it also all feels a bit light and softened to make it more audience friendly. That was probably the right decision commercially, but maybe not artistically. If original director Martin Brest had been allowed to finish the film, with the somewhat darker original script I read back then, I wonder if this could have been a bit of a minor classic, in the family of great nuclear war films like Dr. Strangelove and Fail Safe, instead of an entertaining, intelligent thrill ride. There are also, on reflection some big logic holes you could fly missiles through.
But at the end of the day, I still enjoyed re-seeing it, smiling a good deal of the time.