Talk:Fail Safe (1964 film)

message: At the very end of the movie, shortly before dropping the bomb, the pilot appears to inject himself with something. What? Why? Or did I misinterpret what I saw? Barnabypage 21:03, 1 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  A question about the 2000 TV movie 

message: This claim was once the article's last sentence: "The term "fail-safe" has entered common speech based on the plot of the movie; it means to allow some sort of modest retaliation, or even perform it yourself, to avoid a greater escalation of hostilities."
I have removed it, because it is unsourced, and contradicts my own understanding of the word (confirmed by a peek at Dictionary.com).  Fail-safe, in everyday speech, seems to mean exactly what it's original "engineering use" would suggest: A measure intended to mitigate total failure in the event of an unexpected malfunction or unintended circumstance.  This meaning has little to do with "retaliation". Xoloz 02:47, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: i.e. a piece of equipment should fail into a safe condition. Which means that the film's title is probably a wry joke; the system fails deadly. -Ashley Pomeroy 01:24, 27 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: "Fail-safe" used as a term

message: :Image:Fail safe moviep.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.
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BetacommandBot (talk) 05:38, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Fair use rationale for Image:Fail safe moviep.jpg

message: American fighert planes are deployed to meet the potential threat.  Strategic bombers are dispersed...  George O'Connor (talk) 09:14, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  American bomber planes are deployed to meet the potential threat 

message: I am strongly tempted to wipe out the entire section about the radio jamming inaccuracy!  The only difference between SSB and AM voice is that you need a bit over twice as much power - all other things being equal - to make a given channel or range unusable. Not really a big technical hurdle. EAMs can be sent on several channels at high power, but the fact that SSB is used hardly changes anything! If anyone seconds this, I'll do the delete.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Spamhog (talk • contribs) 16:22, 2 June 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  SSB _is_ easily jammed! 

message: The article says:
:"However, due to a technical failure, the attack code of "CAP 811" (rather than the recall order) is transmitted to Group Six, which consists of six Vindicator supersonic bombers (see B-58 Hustler as used for stand-in aircraft in the movie: Dr. Strangelove)."
Didn't Dr. Strangelove use only a B-52 mockup, and no B-58's? – Wdfarmer (talk) 10:01, 19 July 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: You've got two different movies here- Dr. Stranglove... was set in a B-52 base and had them attacking the Soviet Union while Fail Safe had fictional "Vindicators" that were actually B-58 Hustlers in drag. LOL FWiW Bzuk (talk) 16:09, 19 July 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: That's my point.  Why does this article say "see B-58 Hustler as used for stand-in aircraft in the movie: Dr. Strangelove" if no B-58's were used in Dr. Strangelove? – Wdfarmer (talk) 01:51, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Corrected although the note about the B-58 is in two places (a bit repetitive but is important as a production note). FWiW Bzuk (talk) 11:25, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  B-52, not B-58's, right? 

message: There is no problem in adding more details in the plot section, bearing in mind, that there are typically recommended size limits to be considered. Increasing the plot section recently by a three-fold measure, was likely a place to consider some pruning of the new submissions. The plot also should not elaborate on film devices, but these can become part of the lede statement or production section. 16:36, 4 January 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: Enlarging the plot

message: The section about the plagiarism lawsuit is unclear as to whether the film's producers were sued by the writer of Red Alert or the authors of the novel. 68.146.52.234 (talk) 11:33, 12 May 2015 (UTC)
thread_title: Who was sued?

message: Saw a reference that Harvey Wheeler had said he'd written the original version of the story in 1956, eventually published as Abraham '59. Found this article where he does so. Also relates to the lawsuit section.  
Relevant section;   
"My original Dissent “Christmas fantasy” was based on the biblical Abraham. God made Abraham’s salvation depend on his willingness to sacrifice his own son. “Abraham ‘58” I titled the story when the mailings started in 1957. It appeared as “Abraham ’59” by F. B. Aiken. In real life I study the work of the 17th century philosopher who signed himself “F. Bacon.” F.B. Aiken made me a good pen name. It got the lead cover listing of the Winter 1959 Dissent : “Abraham ’59 – a Nuclear Fantasy,” by F.B. Aiken. Bud Burdick was given a copy but he had forgotten.
  
The late Martin Gang (Gang, Tyre, Rudin & Brown) was our lawyer. He had assigned to us a very bright and personable young attorney, Frank Wells – later to become President of Disney. When the law suit struck, and without telling any of the others, I called Frank for an appointment - “got something to show you.” The upscale Hollywood law offices of Gang, Tyre, Rudin & Brown were quietly sedate. After being seated across from Frank’s desk I handed him the Dissent issue. He was puzzled. I pointed out the Aiken article. Still puzzlement. “Aiken is my pen name,” I explained. “Oh,....so..?” “Yes, this is the first version of Fail-Safe, but I actually wrote the story in 1956 and tried for two years to publish it everywhere.” Frank scanned “Abraham” quickly. A big grin spread across his face. He picked up the magazine and ran through the offices waving it and yelling “We won!... we won!” And we did, handsomely.
  
A noisy five-way conference phone call was held: Burdick in Japan, our film agent, Ziggie Zigler in Pasadena, Martin Gang in Hollywood, Max Youngstein in New York, and me in Santa Barbara. I argued we should press a counter-suit against Columbia, Kubrick and Peter George, author of Red Alert - he’d been fiction editor at more than one of the U.S. magazines I’d sent “Abraham ‘58"! But the bad phone connections made argument impossible. A suit would tie up our film, and Youngstein’s account was hemorrhaging. I agreed to a settlement. Columbia Pictures took over the film contract and made the picture just like Youngstein wanted. F.B. Aiken and “Abraham ‘59” figure prominently in our settlement contract with Columbia."219.88.68.195 (talk) 01:43, 29 June 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Abraham '59 

message: I'd like to put forward the suggestion that the title page of this Wikipedia article (and within the article) be changed from Fail Safe, to Fail-Safe. 
The title card during the film's opening has a hyphen between the two words. 
The original novel also has a hyphen (as per its Wikipedia page).
(Though I do note that the film's original trailer has no hyphen, and neither does some of the film posters of the time)
--Rhettrospective (talk) 12:35, 13 January 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: I too noticed that the film itself was inconsistent with the hyphen. The term should have one, or be a single word, but for some reason, the film production was ambiguous about it. I sometimes wonder if the image of the plane in the poster is meant to be the hyphen. Note that IMDb hyphenates its entry for the film. Eric talk 12:54, 13 January 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: I noticed that as well on the poster, and one could consider that to represent a hyphen.
The film title itself is hyphenated in the opening credit, so I suspect it should be added.  Problem is, I can't see where in the Edit tab one actually changes the heading of the wikipedia page
--Rhettrospective (talk) 12:25, 14 January 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: Renaming an article is done by moving the page. See WP:Move. It might be good to get some input from other editors first. Eric talk 16:56, 14 January 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Hyphen? 

message: The article says "Fail Safe so closely resembled Red Alert that George filed a plagiarism lawsuit", citing LoBrutto, p. 242. The use of "plagiarism" is consistent with what LoBrutto says (although LoBrutto suggests it was Kubrick, not George, who sued; but the passive voice makes it hard to be certain):  "A plagiarism suit was launched against Youngstein's ECA, Burdick, Wheeler, their publisher McGraw-Hill, and Curtis Publishing, which serialized Fail-Safe."
The only problem is, plagiarism isn't (and wasn't in 1963) grounds for suit. Plagiarism is the academic offense of using someone else's words or ideas without giving proper credit, passing them off as one's own. What was undoubtedly filed here was a copyright infringement suit. An act can be both copyright infringement and plagiarism, but only the copyright infringement is actionable. (For example, copy ideas without giving credit: plagiarism, an academic no-no, but completely legal; copy a chapter or two of someone else's work, but being upfront that someone else is the author: no plagiarism, but actionable copyright infringement; copy a plot of a novel: plagiarism, if no credit is given, and maybe copyright infringement, depending on the scope of protection and exactly what was used, but only the copyright infringement aspect is actionable.)
So do we replicate LoBrutto's error, and incorrectly say it was a suit for "plagiarism"; or do we correct it to "copyright infringement" and possibly going astray of WP:OR? TJRC (talk) 19:22, 18 August 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: Never mind; after a moment's reflection, the solution was obvious; find better sources that get it right and edit accordingly, sidestepping the OR issue. TJRC (talk) 19:33, 18 August 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Plagiarism" 

message: The voice actor who played the Russian general (Kornilev?) is not listed. 47.200.80.102 (talk) 13:37, 28 February 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Russian general?