Despite the constant stress by The General on the fate of the world depending on a desperate race against the clock, director Barry Mahon never manages to instill any sense of urgency into 'Rocket Attack U.S.A.', since the need to pad out to feature length a script already over-burdened with long dialogue scenes set in offices means that nothing is ever done quickly and the action is padded out with digressions like an interminable belly dance in a Moscow nightclub. SPOILER COMING: Then suddenly two of the main characters are abruptly killed off, and as in 'Dr. Strangelove' and 'Fail-Safe' the worst happens.The stock footage that makes up much of the film is interesting to watch, and it manages to anticipate the Cuban missile crisis by four years (it carries a 1958 copyright date), as well as the leadership coups staged by hard-liners in the Kremlin that unseated Khrushchev (who is never mentioned in the film by name) in 1964 and Gorbachev in 1991, but is unfortunately so dull that you're unlikely to still be paying attention when after dragging its heels for the previous sixty minutes it all abruptly ends with a bang.

Holy hell, this just might be the most tedious movie ever made. Stunningly wooden performances, incomprehensible logic, a hero so incompetent he manages to get himself and the alleged love interest gunned down in the act of failing to attach a bomb that Wile E Coyote would sneer at to the one rocket the cardboard Russians manage to build.... the whole thing topped off with a portentous voice-over that constantly intrudes to tell us what the characters are doing, as they're in the midst of doing it.... all to tell us the story of how the Russians were secretly building a brand new terror-weapon that the Germans had successfully built and used a decade previously.You know a movie's bad when even the MST3K crew struggle to make enough fun of it. When they actively complain about how bored *they* are, it's a World Champion Stinker.

...but it comes close. At least it isn't too long. There are some dragged out parts, mainly in the beginning when the "agent" meets the "spy", and they focused quite a bit of time on the belly-dancer. Though, compared to the whole of the film, that is worth a watch by itself. Much of it seems to be stock footage. The funny thing is is that if the U.S. successfully launched a satellite first, the world may have reacted with certain paranoia as the U.S. did. Perhaps not on the same scale. It seems, overall to be like one of those "after school" educational programs except this one filled in fear. As I stated: it isn't the worst out there. But it's close.

I can't disagree with the comments made by other contributors, so I will instead try to give you an outline of the plot.First, there are sort of two movies here; the initial rocket espionage and then, the atomic readiness material at the end.In the first story, and erstwhile American agent is sent to Russia after the Sputnik launch to find out if it was just a publicity stunt, and if not, what data & science could the Russians get from a satellite that orbited Earth and crossed the USA.In Russia, he hooks up with an underground woman, posing as a belly dancer who has hooked up with a Russian rocket program minister. She allows the agent to live with her and spy on her sessions with the minister to get critical information.Later, the girl heads for a final rocket test, then summons the agent - through, I think, a member of British intelligence. After some skullduggery and stock footage, the girl is shot by a soldier guarding the rocket, but manages to shoot him to save the agent. The agent gets caught attaching a bomb to the rocket, but escapes in a gun battle. The soldiers get the bomb off the rocket and it explodes safely (?) nearby. The American agent hears the explosion and thinks he has destroyed the rocket. He returns to the girl (now dead) and is, himself, strafed by machine fire and killed. END PART ONE.In Part Two, we see some very short vignettes about a husband & wife discussing duty and air raids, Russian generals plotting, blue collar guys discussing buying a tie, and etc. Soon, the Russian ICBM is launched, America is on alert, sirens go off, and the radio announcer keeps us posted and eventually says goodbye to his wife & kid. It is determined that New York is the target, and Nike missiles are sent up to shoot down the ICBM, but to no avail.During this part of the film, a single lower-ranking general has been manning a telephone (stenographer at his side), making all calls and decisions. Too late, he finally calls the president.We see the ICBM up in space, then coming down, and finally mushrooming over Manhattan.Final scene: "We can not let this be.......THE END".A very weird little film, but unique!