Fail Safe (2000 film)

2000 American television thriller film directed by Stephen Frears

Fail Safe is a 2000 televised broadcast play, based on Fail Safe, the Cold War novel by Eugene Burdick and Harvey Wheeler. The play, broadcast live in black and white on CBS, starred George Clooney, Richard Dreyfuss, Harvey Keitel, and Noah Wyle, and was one of the few live dramas on American television since its Golden Age in the 1950s and 1960s. The broadcast was introduced by Walter Cronkite (his introduction, also broadcast in black and white, is included in the DVD releases of the film): it was directed by veteran British filmmaker Stephen Frears. The novel was first adapted into a 1964 film of the same name directed by Sidney Lumet; the TV version is shorter than the 1964 film due to commercial airtime and omits a number of subplots.

In the early to mid 1960s, the height of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union. An unknown aircraft approaches North America from Europe. U. S. Vindicator bombers of the Strategic Air Command (SAC) are scrambled to their fail safe points near the Russian Far East. The bombers have orders not to proceed past their fail safe points without receiving a special attack code. The original threat is proven to be innocuous and recall orders are issued. However, due to a technical failure, the attack code, CAP811, is transmitted to Group Six, which consists of six Vindicator supersonic bombers and four escort fighters. Colonel Grady, the commanding pilot of Group Six, tries to contact SAC headquarters in Omaha to verify the fail safe order (called "Positive Check"), but due to Soviet radio jamming, Grady cannot hear Omaha. Concluding that the attack order and the radio jamming could only mean war, Grady commands Group Six towards Moscow, their intended destination. At meetings in Omaha, the Pentagon, and in the fallout shelter of the White House, U. S. politicians and scholars debate the implications of the attack. Professor Groteschele suggests the United States follow this accidental attack with a full scale attack to force the Soviets to surrender. The U. S. President orders the Air Force to send the four escort fighters after the bombers to shoot down the Vindicators. The attempt is to show that the Vindicator attack is an accident, not a full scale nuclear assault. After using their afterburners in an attempt to catch the bombers, the fighters run out of fuel and crash, dooming the pilots to die of exposure in the Arctic Sea. The fighters fail to destroy any bombers. The U. S. President then contacts the Premier of the Soviet Union and offers assistance in attacking the group. The Soviets decline at first; later, they decide to accept the Americans' help. Meanwhile, the Soviet PVO Strany air defense corps has managed to shoot down two of the six planes. After accepting American help they shoot down two more planes. Two bombers remain on course to Moscow. One is a decoy and carries no bombs. The other carries two 20 megaton devices. General Bogan tells Marshal Nevsky, the Soviet air defense commander, to ignore the decoy plane because it is harmless. Nevsky, who mistrusts Bogan, instead orders his Soviet aircraft to pursue the decoy aircraft. The Soviet fighters are then out of position to intercept the final U. S. bomber. The decoy's feint guarantees that the remaining bomber can successfully attack. Following the failure, Nevsky collapses. As the bomber approaches Moscow, Colonel Grady opens up the radio to contact SAC to inform them that they are about to make the strike. As a last minute measure, the Soviets fire a barrage of nuclear tipped missiles to form a fireball in an attempt to knock the low flying Vindicator out of the sky. The bomber shoots up two decoy missiles, which successfully leads the Soviet missiles high in the air and Colonel Grady's plane survives. With the radio open, the President attempts to persuade Grady that there is no war. Grady's son also attempts to convince him. Under standing orders that such a late recall attempt must be a Soviet trick, Grady ignores them. Grady tells his crew that "We're not just walking wounded, we're walking dead men," due to radiation from the Soviet missiles. He intends to fly the aircraft over Moscow and detonate the bombs in the plane. His co pilot notes, "There's nothing to go home to." Meanwhile, the American president has ordered another American bomber to circle over New York with a 40 megaton payload, which should be dropped in case of the bombing of Moscow. The American ambassador in Moscow reports about the final moments of the Soviet capital before being vaporized from the blast. The American bomber receives an order to drop its bombs over New York in order for the destruction of Moscow to be reciprocated and a Third World War avoided. It was earlier revealed that the U. S. President's wife was in New York while the events of the film transpired, meaning she would be killed in the blast. The pilot of the American bomber, General Black, commits suicide with a lethal injection just after releasing the bombs. New Yorkers are shown going about their lives, unaware of their imminent doom. The screen fades to white, and text appears listing the nine countries with nuclear capability as of 2000.

The April 9, 2000 presentation was the first live broadcast of a dramatic movie (a televised play) on CBS since May 1960. The production was shot and aired in black and white (the same format as the 1964 theatrical film), using 22 cameras on multiple sets.