Ice Station Zebra (1968)

 'Ice Station Zebra' is classic Saturday matinee fair, the kind of movie my father loved. The film got poor to middling reviews when it came out and I wasn't expecting to like it much but wanted to see it because again it is the kind of movie my dad loved, and I like to watch those to remember him, as well as it's being a pretty big title from a solid director (John Sturgess) and boasting a good cast (Rock Hudson, Ernest Borgnine, and Patrick McGoohan in a rarish film role). This is a largely submarine based cold war espionage movie, and is best when it's on the submarine, the scenes before the mission and after the arrival at the titular ice station didn't work as well for me (the production design for the artic set is extremely dated and fake, almost distractingly unconvincing). I don't think there is a single woman in this picture, even in the bar sequence at the beginning of the movie. The film is still good, better then I thought it would be, but it could really use some editing, cutting 15 to 20 minutes off its 150 minute running time would have helped a lot. Still ***