The China Syndrome - Trivia, Questions and Fun Facts

[albert]

The Columbia Pictures studio expressed early interest in this independently produced motion picture and picked it up for distribution immediately upon the completion of shooting.

[addison]

Executive producer Bruce Gilbert said of the film's writer-director James Bridges: "The practical advantages of working with a writer-director are obvious, but Jim Bridges [James Bridges] proved to be an invaluable collaborator. Contributing first as a writer, he read researched and absorbed all the ideas that were in motion. His greatly expanded script is extremely rich in concepts and characters which parallel and interweave with fascinating complexity. Inspired by a location, a prop or an actor's suggestion, Jim often presented newly-revised scenes during shooting, creating a highly spontaneous flow to the long filming schedule. As a director, Bridges is both straightforward and subtle, a rare combination that provides great satisfaction to both audience and actor".

[tammy]

The model for the control room of the plant was based upon the control room at the Trojan Nuclear Power Plant in Rainier, Oregon (along the Columbia River). At the time, it was the only nuclear plant in the US to offer tours that included a tour of the gallery that looked down into the control room.

[melinda]

Producer Michael Douglas creatively demanded a harsh realism for the film by not having any music score on the soundtrack except for the Stephen Bishop's theme song "Somewhere in Between".

[nicholas]

When the film was first released on 16 March 1979, nuclear power executives soon lambasted the picture as being "sheer fiction" and a "character assassination of an entire industry". Then twelve days after its launch, the Three Mile Island nuclear accident occurred near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

[dustin]

For his role as an anguished engineer in this film, actor Jack Lemmon returned to the kind of dramatic performance that earned him a second Academy Award for his starring role in Save the Tiger (1973). Lemmon's first Oscar win, for Best Supporting Actor in Mister Roberts (1955), was for Lemmon's endearingly funny 'Ensign Pulver' role. For The China Syndrome (1979), Lemmon was Oscar nominated again, in the Best Actor in a Leading Role category, but lost out to Dustin Hoffman for Kramer vs. Kramer (1979).