Everyone would like at least one second chance in life, but what if fate gave you the opportunity to prevent one of the most horrific events of the 20th Century? That's the question facing the crew of the U.S.S. Nimitz during the 1980 time travel adventure The Final Countdown.

Kirk Douglas plays Captain Matthew Yelland, the commander of the U.S.S. Nimitz. While on maneuvers, an unusual storm moves in and totally engulfs the aircraft carrier. The ship survives the storm, but the Captain and his crew pick up strange radio broadcasts as they get closer to Hawaii. The music is from the late 1930's and attempts to contact nearby naval bases are met with hostile reactions.

As strange as it seems, Captain Yelland and his senior staff determine that the U.S.S. Nimitz has somehow been transported back to December 1941, a few days before the Japanese attacked the naval base at Pearl Harbor. They even locate Samuel Chapman (Charles Durning), a Congressman who had originally been killed before the attack.

Captain Yelland never had to make a command decision such as this one. The attack on Pearl Harbor took the lives of hundreds of American sailors, and the U.S.S. Nimitz, with its modern jet fighters and weapons, could attack the Japanese fleet and save American lives. Pearl Harbor also was the event that prompted the United States to enter World War II, and by interfering with history, Captain Yelland could cause more harm than good.

Unlike the more explosive 2001 epic Pearl Harbor, The Final Countdown looks at the events of December 7, 1941 from an entirely different perspective. The senior crew members on the U.S.S. Nimitz know exactly where and when the Japanese will strike, but they don't know if they have the right to stop them.

Pearl Harbor was still fresh in the minds of some viewers as they watched The Final Countdown in theaters back in 1980. It definitely was cool to watch the then state-of-the-art jets fly circles around the Japanese planes from 1941, knowing that a few well-placed missiles could have forced the enemy fleet to retreat.