Twilight's Last Gleaming (1977)

Plot: A disgraced USAF general takes over an ICBM silo, and threatens to start nuclear war unless his demands are met.
Stars: Burt Lancaster, Charles Durning, Richard Widmark, Paul Winfield,  Burt Young
Best Quote:  Gentlemen, we are now a superpower.

Twilight's Last Gleaming has some excellent actors and a good story idea but its botched in execution. You can start with the casting.  Charles Durning is simply awful. Nobody would elect this fat, sweaty guy as President!* Second, for a "thriller" its simply too long (2.5 hours) and too sluggish. Lancaster and his buddies take a long 30 minutes to take over the silo and make their demands.  And once they do, we spend another static, gabby, 110 minutes before the President agrees to Lancaster's terms**.  Almost all the 110 minutes is spent in only two places: the Oval Office and Silo Launch room.  Its talk, talk, talk - on two cheap sound-stages.

The Credibility Problem
So many absurd things happen - it hurts the movie.  I'll list some:

• 64 y/o Lancaster not only breaks out of Prison with 3 accomplices - he gains control of an ICBM missile site with nothing more than a few pistols and some social security numbers!
•  Evidently, none of the scriptwriters  heard of things called  "Picture Badges".
• One person - by themselves - can't fire off an ICBM.
• Why does Lancaster demand the President read the NSC memo on TV? Lancaster *has* the NSC minutes.  Why not just give them to the Press?
• No General would allow a sniper to shoot the POTUS

The Biggest Problem of All
The movie wants us to root for Lancaster. He's been framed for murder one (it was actually manslaughter) and he wants America to be told *THE TRUTH* about Vietnam - dammit! The problem is, he's willing to start a nuclear war and kill 100 million Russians and Americans. And he's not bluffing. Half-way through the movie, he stops a Widmark attack by activating the launch.  And Lancaster does kill five or six people getting into the Silo.  But they're just "red-shirts" so they don't count. But then we find out, THE TRUTH ABOUT VIETNAM - isn't anything special. Y'see we got into Vietnam and  killed hundreds of  thousands and committed atrocities to prove to the USSR we were "capable of anything".  Yeah, sure.  Okey-dokey.

Lancaster Performance
Burt doesn't have much to do much acting- except sit in the Control room, make demands, and calm down Winfield and Young.

* = The producers had Joseph Cotton, Charles McGraw, Widmark and Lancaster. But they gave the POTUS part to Durning. Incredible.
** = To make it even duller, any wide-awake viewer knows the POTUS has to agree to the terms - the alternative is nuclear war.