Review of Ice Station Zebra (1968) by Niclas H — 28 Apr 2014

Directed by John Sturges (Bad Day at Black Rock (1955), The Magnificent Seven (1960) and The Great Escape (1963)) and based upon the 1963 book by Alistair MacLean, which was inspired by an actual operation that occurred in 1959.

It was intended to reunite the cast of The Guns of Navarone (1961), but delays put the kibosh on that. It tries to be suspenseful, but it's overlong and quite dull. Commander James Ferraday (Rock Hudson), who is in charge of the U.

S. nuclear attack submarine USS Tigerfish, which is stationed at Holy Loch in Scotland. Ferraday is asked by Admiral Garvey (Lloyd Nolan) to take the Tigerfish into the Arctic, to save the survivors of the British research station Ice Station Zebra, which suffered an accident.

Ferraday is told to take along British intelligence agent Mr. Jones (Patrick McGoohan), Combat Commander Captain Anders (Jim Brown) and Russian Defector Boris Vaslov (Ernest Borgnine), who will aid with this mission.

However, once they break through the ice and get to the station, priorities and plans change. It should have been a good spy thriller, but too much time is spent on the submarine, and by the time we get into the Arctic, the film has already been smothered.

It has a good cast as well, but the film is overlong, it could have done with half an hour trimmed from it to speed things along and keep it tighter and to the point.