Ice Station Zebra

The film Ice Station Zebra, 50 years old this year, is forever linked to the series The Prisoner by the presence of Patrick McGoohan, who took time away from the one to make the other, infamously leading to Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling being as bad as it is.

Not only that, but also his character in this is very similar to that of Number Six (and, not coincidentally, that of John Drake* from Danger Man) - a British secret agent, secretive, used to working alone and keeping his thoughts to himself. And like in The Prisoner he has no name given in this, since "Jones" is stated to be a codename. He even thumps a table at one point, although I didn't notice if it broke any saucers.

I can't tell if nobody told McGoohan he wasn't supposed to be the main character, or if somebody did and he thought "we'll see about that!"

Two and a half hours may be a pretty standard length for a movie these days but in 1968 it seems it was felt an intermission was required at the halfway point. How fortunate then that the story has two clearly identifiable halves - the journey of the submarine to the titular ice station, and then what happens when they get there.

So the journey there is structured almost like the opening of an Agatha Christie murder mystery - we are introduced to all the main characters, almost one-by-one, get to know them as they establish their relationships with each other - who knows who already, who trusts who, and who doesn't - all within the confines of an environment that none of them can leave, in this case a US Navy nuclear submarine on its way to a rescue mission. Then, instead of a murder, we get an act of sabotage, and the revelation that the saboteur must be one of them. (Technically the sabotage could have been set up back at the naval base, but then my comparison doesn't work so just go along with it. Anyway, the saboteur does turn out to be one of them so it's fine. Mew.)

The submarine scenes are, while not slow, quite leisurely, dialogue-heavy, character-building scenes alternating with scenes of the submacrewmen going about their business, and interspersed with cinematic shots of the submarine surfacing or diving as required. The goal here is not so much to build suspense - although it does, in a kind of claustrophobic way - but to make the sudden moment of action when the sabotage goes off seem all the more unexpected for us the audience as well as the characters.

The sabotage itself is dealt with with only one fatality among the crew, so when the intermission comes it is hardly a cliffhanger moment (in fact the interval is placed at a moment of calm between events), but the identity of the saboteur remains unknown and is carried forward as a mystery for the second half.

Part two is itself divisible into two sections – the first is all action, all the time, as our heroes leave the matter of the saboteur in their midst aside to battle against the arctic environment for their survival. The bit where some of the mannys fall into an ice crevice and have to be quickly rescued before it closes up and traps them is the sort of adventure serial stuff that Terry Nation would (and did) put in his Doctor Who stories whenever he got the chance.

Once they reach Ice Station Zebra itself it lets up slightly, but only slightly, as the cast divides up between those helping the survivors (and questioning them about exactly what happened there, allowing the exposition to come out somewhat naturally), and those searching for the MacGuffin – a set of satellite photos that would give the possessing nation a huge advantage in the Cold War, as McGoohan explains to Rock Hudson’s character in a lengthy scene of pure exposition. At least McGoohan has the skills to pull this off, helped by some good-natured back-and-forth with Hudson about whose country is most to blame for the Soviets getting their hands on the technology.

Speaking of the Russians, the second half of the second half kicks in when they turn up, having waited for the weather to clear before flying in. For the good guys, the fight for survival against the elements is replaced by the fight to survive against an overwhelming force of Soviet paratroopers.

The identity of the saboteur is revealed to us before the rest of the characters, building suspense very effectively and leading to the film’s most shocking moment where McGoohan is tricked into shooting the wrong manny!

But after that the film rather loses its momentum – not helped I’m sure by McGoohan’s character being injured and having to take a back seat for most of the last act. The stand off between the Russians and the Americans is stagily directed, with the Russian commander standing around explaining the situation in simple, unambiguous terms lest there be any confusion as to what is going on. The resolution is at least reasonably well foreshadowed, with Hudson possessing a device to ensure neither side wins – a destruct switch that Terry Nation would have been proud of, although I’m sure he would have added a countdown or two in there also.

* "Jones" obviously isn't Drake or Number Six since he keeps a gun under his pillow, something neither of them would ever do. He could maybe be Curtis from The Schizoid Man though...