This week’s pick is the 1980 military/science fiction classic The Final Countdown directed by Don Taylor, which stars Kirk Douglas (Capt. Matt Yelland), Martin Sheen (Warren Lasky), James Farentino (Air Wing Cmdr. Richard Owen/Richard Tideman), Katherine Ross (Laurel Scott), Ron O’ Neal (Cmdr. Dan Thurman), Charles Durning (Senator Samuel Chapman) and Co-Troma Films creator Lloyd Kaufman (Lt. Cmdr. Lloyd Kaufman).

The film opens in 1980 where a civilian analyst Warren Lasky (Sheen) is sent aboard the U.S.S. Nimitz (America’s largest nuclear powered aircraft carrier) on a fact finding mission. The ship’s commanding officer, Capt Matt Yelland (Douglas) sees Lasky’s presence as a nuisance but tries to extend him as much courtesy as possible while he’s there to report for the Department of Defense.

Things appear to be running smoothly as the Nimitz and several other escort ships are on a routine training exercise in the Pacific Ocean when a fierce storm comes out of nowhere. The Nimitz passes through a storm unlike any ever recorded. A piercing sonic shrill throws the crew into disorientation and wreaks havoc on the ship as it passes through to calmer seas. At first the crew is dazed and unaware of what has happened to them. Capt. Yelland sounds general quarters and the ship goes to battle stations. Capt. Yelland, Lasky, Cmdr. Thurman (O’Neal) and Cmdr. Owen (Farentino) try to piece together just what has happened to the ship and to them.

The Captain calls for a meeting of all his department heads to find out why they are unable to contact their escorts, Pacific Command, or anyone for that matter. Capt. Yelland orders an F-8 Crusader photo reconnaissance flight to make a run over Pearl Harbor, Hawaii to see if there was a possible nuclear strike.

Merry Christmas to all you War Movie Monday fans and thank you for following this year’s cavalcade of classic war pictures. This week’s pick is in honor of the Christmas season, with the 1953 William Wilder classic Stalag 17 which follows a group of American Air Force prisoners of war who are faced with a traitor among them in this movie adapted from the hit Broadway play by Donald Bevan and Edmund Trzcinski who were both prisoners in the infamous Austrian camp.

The film stars William Holden (Sgt. Sefton), Don Taylor (Lt. Dunbar), Otto Priminger (Col. Von Scherbach), Robert Strauss (Stanislas “Animal” Kasava), Harvey Lembeck (Harry Shapiro), Peter Graves (Price), Sig Ruman (Sgt. Schulz), Gil Stratton (Clarence Harvey “Cookie” Cook), Neville Brand (Duke), and Richard Erdman (Hoffy). The film’s narration is performed by Stratton throughout the film.

The film opens with an escape performed by two inmates Manfredi and Johnson, who plan to tunnel out through the wire and make their way to neutral Switzerland. Thinking that all precautions have been taken, barracks chief Hoffy (Erdman) green lights the escape and the two men are intercepted and shot by the German guards who have been tipped off about the escape.

Seasons greetings to all you loyal War Movie Monday fans out there in The Flickcast universe. In keeping with the theme of war films which happen around the holidays, I am proud to present this week’s pick, the 1949 MGM classic Battleground which salutes the “Battered Bastards” of 2nd Squad, 3rd Platoon of Item Company, 327th Glider Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne who were cut off and surrounded by the Germans during the Battle of the Bulge in December 1944. To ensure that veterans seeing the film would not criticize the accuracy of certain events, the regiment was a composite of units which had fought the offensive in the Ardennes.

The film stars a troop of Hollywood greats which include Van Johnson (Holley), John Hodiak (Jarvess), Ricardo Montalban (Rodriguez), George Murphy (“Pop” Stazak), Marshall Thompson (Jim Layton), Jerome Courtland (Abner Spudler), Don Taylor (Standiferd), Douglas Fowley (“Kipp” Kippton), James Whitmore (Sgt. Kinnie), and Richard Jaeckel (Bettis).

Battleground was one of the first major hits for MGM in over five years since the war had ended. During the war, many films had shown battlefield conditions, but Battleground was the first to show the audience just how painful it truly was. The film is a fantastic display which shows men in combat as extremely vulnerable and succumbing to battle fatigue or what is referred to today as Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome.