The Andromeda Strain - 1971
The picture runs 130 minutes!... The story covers 96 of the most critical hours in man's history!... The suspense will last through your lifetime!
Director
Robert Wise
Writers
Michael Crichton novel
Nelson Gidding
Producer
Robert Wise
Cast
Arthur Hill - Dr. Jeremy Stone
David Wayne - Dr. Charles Dutton
James Olson - Dr. Mark Hall
Kate Reid - Dr. Ruth Leavitt
Paula Kelly - Karen Anson
George Mitchell - Jackson
Ramon Bieri - Maj. Manchek
Kermit Murdock - Dr. Robertson
Richard O'Brien - Grimes
Peter Hobbs - Gen. Sparks
Eric Christmas - Senator from Vermont
Mark Jenkins - Lt. Shawn
Peter Helm - Sgt. Crane
Joe Di Reda - Wildfire Computer Sgt. Burk
Carl Reindel - Lt. Comroe
Ken Swofford - Toby
Frances Reid - Clara Dutton
Richard Bull - Air Force major
John Carter - MP Capt. Morton
Haraold O. Dyrenforth - (as Dr. Haraold O. Dyrenforth)
Review by Theo Robertson
The Andromeda Strain (1971)
Effective 70s Chiller But Drags At Points,
I remember seeing THE ANDROMEDA STRAIN as a child and being terrified by it mainly down to the opening scenes of a USAF unit going into a deserted village to retrieve a crashed satellite and finding .... You'll have to watch the seventies film to find out what . But after re-seeing the movie again as an adult I can still say the opening sequence is heart stopping in its tension simply down to the fact that the audience is allowed to use its imagination as to what has happened to the villagers and the recovery team . This is one of the most effective openings I have ever seen in a science fiction movie
Unfortunately it's impossible for the production to keep up the tension though I will give credit for everyone involved in trying . It's just that for reasons of plot the story then revolves around a small team of uber scientists sitting in an underground lab researching something they've found from outer space and finding a way of making sure it doesn't wipe out life on Earth . The main problem is that the story then starts getting bogged down in scientific fact which makes it very difficult for the audience , then to appease the audience the last ten minutes involve a literal race against time which wouldn't look out of place in a James Bond movie . I guess a mainstream audience member who disliked the massive amount of techno-babble on display perked up at the exciting countdown at the end while a microbiologist student who understood the technical dialogue wished the movie had ended on a more intelligent note
There are one or two other slight problems . I did find Dr Ruth Leavitt , written and played as some beatnik intellectual very irritating . But I guess if THE ANDROMEDA STRAIN was remade today we'd see Hilary Duff or Lindsay Lohan as a nobel prize winning scientist so let's not complain about Kate Reid's performance too much . Unless I missed something isn't there a plot hole involving a crashed Phantom jet ? What caused it to crash ? Surely it couldn't have been exposed to the alien visitor unlike say the helicopter that brought back the satellite
But I shouldn't nit pick too much since THE ANDROMEDA STRAIN is a very effective seventies sci-fi chiller though a more modern audience might be put off by a large amount of talky scenes and an absence of special effects
The Andromeda Strain (1971)
Review by Wayne Malin
Good but too faithful to the book, 14 March 2008
Adaptation of Michael Crichton's best seller. An outer space satellite crash lands near the isolated town of Piedmont, New Mexico. Everybody there suddenly dies--except for a small baby and an old man. Some top scientists are called in to investigate--Jeremy Stone (Arthur Hill), Ruth Leavitt (Kate Reid), Charles Dutton (David Wayne) and Mark Hall (James Olson). They discover a deadly bacteria that may be growing and wipe out civilization--but how did the child and old man live?
Crichton's book was pretty difficult to read but was interesting. This movie tries to be faithful to the book and it succeeds--but that's the problem. The book could easily have been tightened but they didn't do that. What was interesting to read just simply does not translate well to the screen. The pace is very slow and the movie runs 130 minutes! To make matters worse the scientists are given no real characterizations. They're walking clichés--nothing more. Even the book gave them more dimensions. Also a lot of the technology here is laughably dated--but I can't fault the movie for when it came out. All that aside it is well directed by Robert Wise--there's some nice use of multiple screens occasionally. Also the actors are very good in their roles despite having nothing to work with. Olson and Reid come off best. But the whole thing is just too slow! Moving things along a little faster could only have helped. For the acting and direction I give this a 7.
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