The China Syndrome

The China Syndrome is a 1979 American disaster thriller film directed by James Bridges and written by Bridges, Mike Gray, and T. S. Cook. It tells the story of a television reporter and her cameraman who discover safety coverups at a nuclear power plant. It stars Jane Fonda, Jack Lemmon, and Michael Douglas, with Douglas also serving as the film's producer. The cast also features Scott Brady, James Hampton, Peter Donat, Richard Herd, and Wilford Brimley. "China syndrome" is a fanciful term—not intended to be taken literally—that describes a fictional result of a nuclear meltdown, where reactor components melt through their containment structures and into the underlying earth, "all the way to China." The China Syndrome premiered at the 1979 Cannes Film Festival, where it competed for the Palme d'Or while Lemmon received the Best Actor prize. The film was released theatrically on March 16, 1979, twelve days before the Three Mile Island nuclear accident in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, which gave the film's subject matter an unexpected prescience. Upon release the film was a critical and commercial success with critics praising the film's screenplay, direction and thriller elements and Fonda's and Lemmon's performances. The film grossed $51.7 million on a production budget of $5.9 million. The film received four nominations at the 52nd Academy Awards: Best Actor (Lemmon), Best Actress (Fonda), Best Art Direction (George Jenkins, Arthur Jeph Parker), and Best Original Screenplay.