Sammy Rice is a British scientist working with a specialist "back room" team in London during the Second World War. Rice is embittered because he feels military scientific research is being incompetently managed. He is also enduring unremitting pain from his artificial foot. The painkillers he has been prescribed are ineffective and his use of alcohol as an analgesic has led to his alcoholism. His girlfriend Susan puts up with his self-pitying, self-destructive behavior as long as she can, but finally breaks up with him, telling him that he lacks the ambition to better himself. Rice is brought in by Captain Stuart to help solve the problem of small booby-trapped explosive devices being dropped by Nazi bombers, which have killed four people, including three children. They receive some useful information from a critically wounded young soldier. Two further mines are found at Chesil Beach: they look like common thermos flasks. Stuart is first on the scene, but has difficulty getting Rice on the telephone, because Rice is alone following his breakup, angry, drunk and destructive. Rice quickly sobers up and travels to Chesil Beach only to find that Stuart tried to defuse one of the mines and has been blown up. Rice sets to work on the second mine after listening to the notes Stuart dictated to an ATS corporal during his effort earlier in the day. He discovers that the mine has two booby traps, not one.

DVD-r is in English with no subtitles. Approx. 107 mins. See film sample for audio and video quality!