The China Syndrome

The China Syndrome (1979) is a tense nuclear thriller you can watch online on iFILM, directed by James Bridges and built around one accidental piece of footage. TV reporter Kimberly Wells is shooting a soft story at a power plant when she captures a near-meltdown on camera.

Jane Fonda plays the reporter chasing the truth, Michael Douglas her cameraman (he also produced the film), and Jack Lemmon a plant engineer who realizes just how close everyone came to disaster. Management shrugs it off as a minor glitch and leans hard on anyone who talks. The closer the crew gets, the more dangerous the story becomes.

The movie opened twelve days before the real Three Mile Island accident, and the timing turned it into a flashpoint in the debate over atomic power. Lemmon took the Best Actor prize at Cannes for his work here, and the film picked up four Oscar nominations. It is a sharp, surprisingly unsentimental look at how a corporation hides a hazard behind paperwork. Stream The China Syndrome (1979) online on iFILM.