Word: lemmons
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1970-1979
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Fonda, a "Happy news" reporter seeking a more substantial story, goes with cameraman Douglas to film a special at a nuclear power plant outside Los Angeles where Lemmon is the control-room supervisor. While getting the standard tour from the plant's public relations man, buzzers ring, bells clang, the control panel lights up like a Christmas tree gone berserk, and the building shakes. Clearly, something is wrong...
...rushes back to the station, convinced that she has a story that will catapult her into hard news and out of fluff. But the station manager kills the story, after conferring with the power company's P.R. man. Fonda and Douglas keep trying to get the story out, and Lemmon joins their effort. The accident has alerted him to serious problems in the plant's safety precautions and he finds that inspection documents have been falsified. Lemmon tries, unsuccessfully, to prevent the plant from starting up again. As in any good thriller, Fonda, Douglas, and Lemmon meet again...
...film is starkly realistic (the sets were designed by the man who re-created The Washington Post newsroom for "All the President's Men") moves quickly, and pays off in a shattering climax. With stars like Fonda, Lemmon, and Douglas, and a subject as hot as nuclear power, the film should be a huge success...
Michael Douglas as cameramen-photographer Adams has a shallow character; the film doesn't pay enough attention to him to get beyond the image of an angry young man trying to recapture the political activism of the '60s. But he works well as the cataylst that brings together Lemmon and Fonda in the finale...
...Lemmon, despite Fonda's good performance and striking beauty, carries the film. Where Fonda and Douglas have roles that don't test them greatly, Lemmon takes a difficult role and plays it masterfully. As Goodell, the station manager, he develops from a staunch defender of nuclear power and its safety to a scandalized activist who realizes that corporate power and economic necessity have corrupted the safety procedures and inspections he holds sacred. Lemmon communicates the emotional torture that Goodell endures before he is finally forced to take action against the officials he believes will destroy his beloved plant--and with...