Everybody's Dead, I Guess.

It's January, 1964, in Melbourne, Australia; a nuclear-powered U.S. submarine arrives at port. "Long-haired" scientists estimate that the survivors of a thermonuclear war have five months to live. Everything north of Down Under seems to be dead already. Now what?

So begins Stanley Kramer's 1959 film version of Nevil Shute's 1957 novel, On the Beach.

Under the circumstances, what would you do?

Inherently compelling as an existential situation, the film elicits strong performances from Gregory Peck, Ava Gardner, and Fred Astaire. Shot in black and white with occasional cockeyed "Dutch angles," it's effective and timeless. After all, we never know when the end will come, and we're each invidually confronted with the same dilemma: how to live our lives fully as mortal beings.

In the film, Moira Davison, the Gardner character, sees what's coming more clearly than most; she rather sensibly chooses to drink large amounts of hooch while wooing Captain Dwight Towers, the Peck character, despite his inability to cope with the fact that his wife and two kids are back in the USA, all dead. Cognitive dissonance seeps into his psyche as insidiously as the deadly radiation drifting their way. Scientist Julian Osborne, the Fred Astaire character, understands what's coming as clearly as Moira, so it's no surprise that the two (he drinks heavily as well) are friends and occasional lovers. Early in the film, Osborne notes that background radiation is already nine times higher than before the war, with worse to come. For his last hurrah, he buys a Ferrari for $100 (Australian), hoping to win the Grand Prix outside of Melbourne. Highlighting the tragic context of plot and character development are junior officer Peter Holmes (the -- as always -- kind of spooky Anthony Perkins), his wife Mary (played by the luminous Donna Anderson), and their infant daughter. Not unnaturally, Mary is (like Towers) in denial; but deep inside, she grasps the horrible truth as much as he does.

The Australian government sends Tower, Osborne, Holmes and the crew of the U.S.S. Sawfish on a last reconnaissance mission to test radiation levels and seek signs of life in the northern hemisphere. A signal coming from the vicinity of San Diego, California, gives some hope of survivors there. Across the board, what they find is not good. Radiation levels are even higher than predicted, and when they arrive in San Francisco Bay, they see through periscope that the streets are deserted even though, eerily, the city's buildings remain intact. This is the only scene I remember as a child: the point where San Franciscan native Swain, a sailor, escapes the sub to join his friends and family in the Land of the Dead. It's a touching scene. (Memory plays tricks, of course -- I remembered him escaping on foot into the city; but in fact, he swims ashore and then, the next day, recounts exploring the streets on foot. My imagining his flight became its own memory). Swain is left fishing in the bay with fewer than five days left to live.

And so it goes. The one aspect of the film that nearly drives me crazy is the relentless musical score -- composed almost entirely of overladen symphonic renderings of "Waltzing Matilda." The song is pure Australian, but I much prefer the later Eric Bogle variation "And the Band Played Waltzing Matilda" (1972), especially as covered by The Pogues, because it gets at Australia's collective traumatic Great War experience and has universal connotations. You can check it out here (and by the way, the Pogues are on tour again): http://pogues.com/Releases/Lyrics/LPs/RumSodomy/Waltzing.html

If today's celebrities seem interesting, how do you suppose the key actors from On the Beach lived their actual lives? And what did Nevil Shute think of the movie version?

To be continued. . . . .

Corregidor signing off. I shall return.