From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Bedford Incident
Directed by	James B. Harris
Produced by	James B. Harris Richard Widmark
Written by	Mark Rascovich (novel) James Poe
Starring	Richard Widmark Sidney Poitier James MacArthur Martin Balsam Wally Cox Eric Portman
Music by	Gerard Schurmann
Cinematography	Gilbert Taylor
Editing by	John Jympson
Distributed by	Columbia Pictures
Release date(s)	October 11, 1965 (U.S.)
Running time	102 min.
Language	English
IMDb profile

The Bedford Incident is a Cold War film from 1965 starring Richard Widmark and Sidney Poitier, and co-produced by Richard Widmark. The cast also features Martin Balsam and Eric Portman, as well as an early appearance by Donald Sutherland. The film was based on the 1963 book by Mark Rascovich, which was patterned after Herman Melville's Moby Dick.

The screenplay was written by James Poe. It was directed by James B. Harris, who up to that point was best known as Stanley Kubrick's producer. Harris had recently split from a nine-year partnership with Kubrick. Just after the split, Kubrick would make Dr. Strangelove (1963), which raises similar issues to The Bedford Incident.

The American destroyer USS Bedford detects a Soviet submarine in the GIUK gap near the Greenland coast. Though they are not at war, Captain Eric Finlander (Widmark) harries his prey mercilessly, while civilian reporter Ben Munceford (Poitier) and NATO naval advisor, Commodore (and ex-World War II U-boat captain) Wolfgang Schrepke (Portman), look on with mounting alarm. The film also features James MacArthur as Ensign Ralston, a inexperienced young officer who is constantly being criticized by his captain for small errors.

Munceford is on board in order to write an article of life on a navy destroyer, but his real interest is Captain Finlander who was recently passed over for promotion to admiral. Munceford is curious as to why. He is treated with mounting hostility by the captain because he is seen as a civilian putting his nose where it does not belong and because he disagrees with Finlander's decision to continue with an unnecessary and dangerous confrontation.

The crew becomes increasingly fatigued by the unrelenting pursuit. Sonar operator Merlin Queffle (Wally Cox) starts hallucinating and has to be relieved. Finally, Ralston mishears a casual conversation ("If he fires one, I'll fire one") and launches an ASROC ("Fire one, aye!") that sinks the quarry, but not before it detects the attack and launches four torpedoes at the destroyer. Despite Munceford's desperate pleas, Finlander makes no attempt to evade the oncoming torpedos, knowing that the incident could escalate beyond control...unless there are no witnesses. As the torpedoes hit the Bedford, the movie ends with still shots of various crewmen "melting" as if the celluloid film were burning through.

The Bedford Incident was mostly filmed at Shepperton Studios in England, although some shots at sea were used, including a vessel portraying a Russian intelligence ship (with English, and not Cyrillic lettering along the side), and a Royal Navy frigate (HMS Wakeful) portraying Bedford in one scene.

USS Bedford (DLG-113) is a fictitious guided missile destroyer. No ship of the United States Navy has been named Bedford, or had the hull classification symbol DLG-113, but the role of Bedford was played by a Farragut-class destroyer.

Poitier's casting appears to be an early example of an African-American taking a major part in a movie in which race is not an issue. His hostile treatment by the all-white crew is not due to racism but more because he is a reporter poking his nose into their business.

• The Bedford Incident at the Internet Movie Database

This article about a war film is a stub. You can help by expanding it.