I think that this was a fair execution of a interesting concept. As in all in all time travel movies the question of "What if?" is the heart of the movie. In Back to the Future, the question was "What if you meet your parents when they were teenagers and alter them falling in love?", In Time after Time, "What if Jack the Ripper stole HG Wells' machine and escaped ?", and so forth. In The Final Countdown, the "What if?" is, What if a 1979 air-craft carrier, fully armored, mysteriously found itself transported to Dec 6, 1941, intercepting the Japanese fleet headed for Pearl Harbor? Lets look at the good and the bad.
The Good.
First and foremost, the concept alone is the best thing going for this flick. The discussions about what to do are very well written and the unavoidable consequences for altering the past are played out very well. The acting is adequate but i really found Martin Sheen and Chales Durring to be the most convincing.
The Bad.
Despite a great idea and decent acting the movie shoots itself in the foot by not going all the way. The entire premise is that this lone carrier is sent back in time to intercept and defeat the attack on Pearl Harbor. The captain and the crew decide to do that very thing and just before they are about to attack they are thrown back to the future. It is such a major cop-out for the movie. I would have loved to have seen the ramifications of stopping the attack. Now i know that changing the past would be the wrong thing to do in most time travel movies. But, in this movie, Time itself is granting this opportunity. If the movie had let the carrier attack the Japanese fleet and then transported them back to the future leaving the open question, What will they find?, it would have been a great change. It is because of the cheap cop-out that really dismantles this film from something special to mere mediocrity.
All in all, if you like time travel movies, its worth a glance but be prepared for a very weak pay-off at the end.
The Good.
First and foremost, the concept alone is the best thing going for this flick. The discussions about what to do are very well written and the unavoidable consequences for altering the past are played out very well. The acting is adequate but i really found Martin Sheen and Chales Durring to be the most convincing.
The Bad.
Despite a great idea and decent acting the movie shoots itself in the foot by not going all the way. The entire premise is that this lone carrier is sent back in time to intercept and defeat the attack on Pearl Harbor. The captain and the crew decide to do that very thing and just before they are about to attack they are thrown back to the future. It is such a major cop-out for the movie. I would have loved to have seen the ramifications of stopping the attack. Now i know that changing the past would be the wrong thing to do in most time travel movies. But, in this movie, Time itself is granting this opportunity. If the movie had let the carrier attack the Japanese fleet and then transported them back to the future leaving the open question, What will they find?, it would have been a great change. It is because of the cheap cop-out that really dismantles this film from something special to mere mediocrity.
All in all, if you like time travel movies, its worth a glance but be prepared for a very weak pay-off at the end.