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The China Syndrome (1979)
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Overview
User Rating:
Release Date:
16 March 1979 (USA) moreTagline:
Today, only a handful of people know what it means... Soon you will know.Plot:
A reporter finds what appears to be a cover-up of safety hazards at a nuclear power plant. full summary | full synopsisAwards:
Nominated for 4 Oscars. Another 6 wins & 13 nominations moreNewsDesk:
(4 articles)
Chris Lemmon: The Hollywood Interview (From The Hollywood Interview. 9 June 2009, 12:28 PM, PDT)
Lost Director Stunned By New York Crash
(From WENN. 23 January 2009, 11:11 AM, PST)
User Comments:
Press Censored even in 1979 moreCast
(Cast overview, first billed only)| Jane Fonda | ... | Kimberly Wells | |
| Jack Lemmon | ... | Jack Godell | |
| Michael Douglas | ... | Richard Adams | |
| Scott Brady | ... | Herman De Young | |
| James Hampton | ... | Bill Gibson | |
| Peter Donat | ... | Don Jacovich | |
| Wilford Brimley | ... | Ted Spindler | |
| Richard Herd | ... | Evan Mc Cormack | |
| Daniel Valdez | ... | Hector Salas | |
| Stan Bohrman | ... | Pete Martin | |
| James Karen | ... | Mac Churchill | |
| Michael Alaimo | ... | Greg Minor | |
| Donald Hotton | ... | Dr. Elliott Lowell | |
| Khalilah Ali | ... | Marge | |
| Paul Larson | ... | D.B. Royce |
Additional Details
Also Known As:
Le syndrome chinois (Canada: French title) (France) [fr]A Síndrome da China (Brazil) [pt]
China Syndrome (Japan: English title) [en]
Chinski syndrom (Poland) [pl]
Dünyanin kaderi (Turkey: Turkish title) [tr]
Das China-Syndrom (West Germany) [de]
El síndrome de China (Spain) [es]
Ha-Syndrome Ha-Sini (Israel: Hebrew title) [iw]
Kína szindróma (Hungary) [hu]
Kiina-ilmiö (Finland) [fi]
Kina-syndromet (Sweden) [sv]
Kina-syndromet (Denmark) [da]
O Síndroma da China (Portugal) [pt]
Síndrome da China (Brazil) [pt]
Sindrome cinese (Italy) [it]
To syndromo tis Kinas (Greece) [el]
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Parents Guide:
View content advisory for parentsRuntime:
122 minCountry:
USALanguage:
EnglishColor:
Color (Metrocolor)Aspect Ratio:
1.85 : 1 moreSound Mix:
MonoCertification:
UK:PG | Australia:PG | Argentina:13 | Chile:14 | Finland:K-12 | Norway:12 (original rating) | Norway:15 (re-rating) | Sweden:11 | USA:PG | West Germany:12 | Singapore:PG | Netherlands:ALFun Stuff
Trivia:
All of the music in the film, including the title song "Somewhere In Between" by Stephen Bishop, comes from normal sources of music within the film: car radios, barroom jukeboxes, television commercials, etc. There is no traditional "soundtrack" of music that the audience can hear but the characters cannot. moreGoofs:
Continuity: When meeting about what to do with the film the next day, a paper leans against Rich's coffee cup, but is gone a moment later. moreSoundtrack:
Somewhere in Between moreFAQ
Why was the pump shaking and shuddering so much?How does the movie end?
Which came first... "China Syndrome" or the meltdown at Three Mile Island?
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AS poor and as distorted as the news in the U.S. is today, I find it refreshing that there were cover-ups and 'arrangements' being made over nuclear plants even in the 70's. Having worked on the software for control systems that theoretically control the nuclear plants, I know that any day now, the 'holes in the Swiss cheese slices' will all line up, and boom!!!! No one is taking the time to provide the care in that software that is continually being 'improved' and building like a house of cards. Safety software engineers are paid NOT to care about the quality of the work, but to rubber stamp the specs.
The inspectors they showed there are today even more incompetent and apathetic. As long as they find a few cosmetic problems to bitch about (e.g., coffee cups hiding alarm buttons), they don't peer any further. And of course, they wouldn't examine the X-rays, or know what they were looking for, if they did. The fox is guarding the henhouse in many areas in which we foolishly think we are protected. This movie attempts to unveil that danger, something movies are no longer allowed to do, since they are made by the same Big Business conglomerates that give you the nuclear plants, the Keystone tires, the Ford roll-overs.
Jane Fonda does a fantastic job of playing the innocent ingenue, something that hard-brained tough lady isn't in real life. And of course, Jack Lennon, dear departed, did one fantastic job as the ill-fated conscience of the nuclear plant. Check this one out of the video store....before all the copies are ordered destroyed. (I'm kidding, but not by much.)
Collusion between the information distorters and dispensers AND Big Business is just one of the themes in this movie, but something that's much more prevalent now than then. Well-written, I want to now see, "The Making of the China Syndrome" to find out what was cut out of it, and how much pressure the makers of this movie were under.
Just one thing: The movie Cher was in, in which she's run off the road, was also about a nuclear plant, and a worker who knows the truth about the apathy to safety at high levels of the plant. Which one copied the other?