James Bridges
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A toxic (but mordantly hilarious) combination of The Paper Chase ’s loftily condescending law professor and a trash-talking sports coach, Fletcher is the kind of unconventional pedagogue who thinks nothing of winging a chair at his pupil’s head when the tempo drags by a fraction of a beat, or punctuating tips on musical timekeeping with a series of brisk slaps to the face.
Think John Houseman in “The Paper Chase’’ with a touch of Jack Webb’s Marine drill sergeant in “The D.I.,’’ and you’ll get an idea of the extreme hazing and mind games from Simmons that push Teller toward the breaking point.
Chazelle pulls together disparate material we know — Fame, The Paper Chase, even Full Metal Jacket — and offers a fresh take on the familiar, rousing as Rocky was in its time.
Neither is it “The Paper Chase,” in which young and old come to an uneasy peace.
Cloud Atlas (2012)
Directed by Lana Wachowski
influenced by The China Syndrome (1979)
Themes Visuals
"Half-Lives: The First Luisa Rey Mystery," for example, feels like a dinner theater production of The China Syndrome, while "An Orison of Sonmi-451" borrows from V for Vendetta, Soylent Green and just about every other dystopian sci-fi flick this side of The Hunger Games.
In the 1970′s, styled to remind us of that era’s “paranoid cinema” films like “The Parallax View” and “The China Syndrome,” an investigative reporter (Berry) gets stuck in an elevator with an elderly scientist who gives her some important information about a nuclear facility.
And, somewhat akin to "The China Syndrome," it has the distinction of having history repeat itself right as it's released.
A House of Dynamite (2025)
Directed by Kathryn Bigelow
influenced by The China Syndrome (1979)
Themes
The China Syndrome…
I also had a strange fascination with films that dealt with those themes from the horrific presentations of the aftermath in the TV film, The Day After and the feature Testament to the dystopian depictions in Miracle Mile to the near-miss silliness of WarGames and the scarily timely docu-portrayal of a nuclear power plant accident in The China Syndrome.
You can find echoes of “The Paper Chase” and even “Animal House” but in the final analysis it is uniquely Indian.
I have said that absent the forbidden love aspect, this film would play flatly and remind one of "Urban Cowboy."
Though the movie deals with the machinations of reporters and is being touted as the best journalism movie since "All the President's Men," it actually has far more in common with 1979's "The China Syndrome" (an executive at a nuclear facility publicizes dangerous practices with the help of a sympathetic TV journalist).
But this one takes the witty joy out of Eddie's exploration of his potential ? the first part of the movie has the zippy energy and humor of Jay McInerney's Bright Lights, Big City ?
Of course, the best horror films have always mirrored real-life goings on but not since Three Mile Island obligingly blew up a week after "The China Syndrome" came out has reel life mirrored real life so closely.
"Michael Clayton" is styled as a throwback to such socially conscious 1970s morality plays as "The China Syndrome" and "The Parallax View."
The list of Academy Award-nominated names set a cultivated tone for a scathing corporate thriller that emanates from the same narrative petri dish that spawned films like "The Parallax View" and "The China Syndrome."
No doubt that hipster façade comes partly from Chuck Palahniuks novel, which, based on the narration, is full of offhand product references and adjectival lists, like Bright Lights, Big City in a head-on with a Sunday circular.
Rising from an early grave of negative pre-release publicity, director Marc Forster and producer-star Brad Pitt ’s much-maligned “World War Z” emerges as a surprisingly smart, gripping and imaginative addition to the zombie -movie canon , owing as much to scientific disaster movies like “The China Syndrome” and “ Contagion ” as it does to undead ur-texts like the collected works of George Romero .
“… director Marc Forster and producer-star Brad Pitt’s much-maligned World War Z emerges as a surprisingly smart, gripping and imaginative addition to the zombie-movie canon, owing as much to scientific disaster movies like The China Syndrome and Contagion as it does to undead ur-texts like the collected works of George Romero.
The Day After Tomorrow (2004)
Directed by Roland Emmerich
influenced by The China Syndrome (1979)
Themes
Let's hope this is no "The China Syndrome."
The real shame of it is that, unlike other great transitional swan songs (The Misfits, for instance), Bright Lights, Big City comes and goes without demonstrating much awareness that it's got nothing to say about the time that produced it and no instinct for the tide blowing into shore.
Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016)
Directed by Zack Snyder
influenced by The China Syndrome (1979)
Visuals
The final shot—no spoiler—constitutes an image, rather than a shot, much like the rumblings at the Three Mile Island reactor causing coffee in cups to slosh in “The China Syndrome”—as well as the crushing bulwark’s lightest invocation of its oozing religiosity.
The most famous incident, of course, was "The China Syndrome" coming out around the time of Three Mile Island.