Limbo (1972)

Limbo was one of Hollywood's first big-studio films to concentrate on how Vietnam affected the families of the combatants. Kathleen Nolan, Kate Jackson and Katherine Justice play three service wives living at a Florida Air Force Base. Their husbands have all been called to active duty in Vietnam, and all have either been captured or are MIAs. Avoiding the propagandistic stance of most war films of its period (and of such World War II films as Tender Comrade), Limbo manages to accurately convey the churned-up emotions of women who love their husbands and their country, but do not love what husbands are expected to do on behalf of that country. Before it is overwhelmed by soap opera suds, the film (scripted by Joan Micklin Silver and James Bridges, both on the verge of bigger things) makes several cogent points about personal relationships in the face of national crisis. Limbo has also been released as Chained to Yesterday and Women in Limbo. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi