Review of On the Beach

This has it is good points, but it has a dessicated feel and it could have been much better. Based on a novel I have heard of many times but never read, I am glad I finally got around to checking it out. This is an early entry in the post-apocalypse genre that treats the subject in a serious, dramatic fashion, with an emphasis on character. So there are no explosions, no mass deaths, no computer generated pyrotechnics. Instead we have a group of people somewhere in Australia (althou only a couple seem to be Aussies) confronted by impending doom in the form of a giant wave of radiation, the result of a nuclear war, heading steadily toward them. People go about their business as if everything is normal, and we never even find out what started the war or who the combatants were. Gregory Peck is the main character, the captain of a submarine, who gets into an affair with the Ava Gardner character. He also leads his ship on an eerie exploration of the California coast, the result of some signals that are being sent from a location there. Fred Astaire is a real surprise as a cool, cynical scientist - no song and dance numbers in this. I never realized what a fine actor he could be. A typical movie would be about overcoming what seems to be inevitable destruction, but this is more about accepting it while finding solace in romantic love.