Roquefort Raider
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Post by Roquefort Raider on Sept 22, 2024 7:26:07 GMT -5
I re-watched the 1984 nuclear war movie Threads yesterday... and it's fully as depressing as when I first saw it thirty-five years ago. It's less soap-operatic than The Day After, which dealt with similar themes and was produced at roughly the same time; Threads has more of a documentary feel to it, not focusing so much on individual characters and what happens to them. Society is the main character, so to speak. While The Day After concludes shortly after the end of the nuclear exchange, with the United States severely damaged and the main characters dying of cancer, Threads briefly cranks the despair dial to eleven by showing us England many years later, reduced to a Middle Ages level society... with its children mentally retarded, and the hope of a renewed world crushed by the final image of a stillbirth. It's a harrowing spectacle, and a good reminder (in these times of renewed international tensions) that no one can win a nuclear war.
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Confessor
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Post by Confessor on Sept 22, 2024 16:00:57 GMT -5
I re-watched the 1984 nuclear war movie Threads yesterday... and it's fully as depressing as when I first saw it thirty-five years ago. It's less soap-operatic than The Day After, which dealt with similar themes and was produced at roughly the same time; Threads has more of a documentary feel to it, not focusing so much on individual characters and what happens to them. Society is the main character, so to speak. While The Day After concludes shortly after the end of the nuclear exchange, with the United States severely damaged and the main characters dying of cancer, Threads briefly cranks the despair dial to eleven by showing us England many years later, reduced to a Middle Ages level society... with its children mentally retarded, and the hope of a renewed world crushed by the final image of a stillbirth. It's a harrowing spectacle, and a good reminder (in these times of renewed international tensions) that no one can win a nuclear war. Threads traumatised a whole generation of us 80s kids.
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Post by driver1980 on Sept 22, 2024 16:54:29 GMT -5
Have either of you seen When the Wind Blows?
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Roquefort Raider
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Post by Roquefort Raider on Sept 22, 2024 17:46:52 GMT -5
Have either of you seen When the Wind Blows? Several times, and it is a beautiful, bittersweet and charming thing. But then I'm a sucker for Raymond Briggs. "Ours is not to reason why"... That old couple was just wonderful.
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Confessor
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Post by Confessor on Sept 22, 2024 18:39:06 GMT -5
Have either of you seen When the Wind Blows? Better than that, I've read the original comic! I have seen the cartoon film too, and even though it's quite a good adaptation, it pales in comparrison to Raymond Briggs' book IMHO. The story of elderly and naive Jim and Hilda Bloggs in the midst of a nuclear attack on Britain has much more impact as sequential art somehow. The book certainly made a huge impression on me as a 12-year-old. I've re-read it many times since then (I even chose it for the 2015 Classic Comics Xmas event) and it never fails to have an impact.
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Post by tartanphantom on Sept 22, 2024 19:07:47 GMT -5
In the vein of these previously mentioned films, I highly recommend Stanley Kramer's On the Beach from 1959.
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Post by berkley on Sept 22, 2024 21:31:07 GMT -5
In the vein of these previously mentioned films, I highly recommend Stanley Kramer's On the Beach from 1959. I just read the Nevil Shute novel that was based on, only a year or two ago, and for the first time. I was really blown away by how good it was. The sense of hopelessness and the seemingly pointless determination to carry on with something like a normal life anyway as long as possible was incredibly powerful and moving.
Not to get away too far from the thread's subject matter of classic movies, but it seems to me that we're in a very disturbing situation right now geopolitically because it appears there are many people, and some of them in decision-making positions, who don't feel the same kind of existential dread of nuclear conflict that most people of our generation or older have grown up with. So I'm afraid we're probably at greater risk of nuclear war than we have been for many years
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Post by driver1980 on Sept 23, 2024 5:40:22 GMT -5
Have either of you seen When the Wind Blows? Several times, and it is a beautiful, bittersweet and charming thing. But then I'm a sucker for Raymond Briggs. "Ours is not to reason why"... That old couple was just wonderful. I can’t remember the exact quote so I’ll have to paraphrase, but it was sad when Jim said something like, “Don’t worry, Hilda, the ambulance service will be here any moment.” And some earlier dialogue about how Jim believed the corner shop would be open again ASAP. Their attempt to continue with normality was perhaps the most touching thing for me.
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Confessor
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Post by Confessor on Sept 23, 2024 6:20:50 GMT -5
Several times, and it is a beautiful, bittersweet and charming thing. But then I'm a sucker for Raymond Briggs. "Ours is not to reason why"... That old couple was just wonderful. I can’t remember the exact quote so I’ll have to paraphrase, but it was sad when Jim said something like, “Don’t worry, Hilda, the ambulance service will be here any moment.” And some earlier dialogue about how Jim believed the corner shop would be open again ASAP. Their attempt to continue with normality was perhaps the most touching thing for me. I have to say that, although I agree that the Bloggs' attempts to "keep calm and carry on" are very touching, they are also kind of annoying. The pair come across as quite stupid -- annoyingly so at times. But of course, that's kinda the point.
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Sept 25, 2024 0:48:54 GMT -5
I get a real kick watching lead actors who are associated with Good Guy roles, showing their range by playing the villains
Henry Fonda , for instance, in 1968's Once Upon A Time In The West Fred MacMurray in 1944's Double Indemnity John Wayne as Genghis Khan in 1956's The Conqueror
Actually, that last one makes me giggle
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Post by berkley on Sept 25, 2024 1:10:07 GMT -5
I get a real kick watching lead actors who are associated with Good Guy roles, showing their range by playing the villains Henry Fonda , for instance, in 1968's Once Upon A Time In The West Fred MacMurray in 1944's Double Indemnity John Wayne as Genghis Khan in 1956's The Conqueror Actually, that last one makes me giggle
I've never seen it but I've always wondered what could have made John Wayne think he could pull off such a character.
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Post by Hoosier X on Sept 25, 2024 9:05:40 GMT -5
I get a real kick watching lead actors who are associated with Good Guy roles, showing their range by playing the villains Henry Fonda , for instance, in 1968's Once Upon A Time In The West Fred MacMurray in 1944's Double Indemnity John Wayne as Genghis Khan in 1956's The Conqueror Actually, that last one makes me giggle The Conqueror is hilarious. Especially Agnes Moorehead laying the groundwork for her portrayal of Endora a few years later. And isn’t William Conrad in it as well? It may not be a good movie but it’s also never boring.
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Post by driver1980 on Sept 25, 2024 9:12:22 GMT -5
I get a real kick watching lead actors who are associated with Good Guy roles, showing their range by playing the villains Henry Fonda , for instance, in 1968's Once Upon A Time In The West Fred MacMurray in 1944's Double Indemnity John Wayne as Genghis Khan in 1956's The Conqueror Actually, that last one makes me giggle I’ve been noticing that with some classic TV I’ve been watching on DVD. William Windom was an army major in an episode of The Invaders who believed David Vincent’s claims. And then I saw him, among other things, as a heroin dealer in Mission: Impossible. William Smithers was a mobster in an episode of Mission: Impossible. Then I saw him in The Invaders as a quiet, unassuming man who had proof of alien activity. J. D. Cannon was a detective lieutenant in the pilot of The Invaders, then a semi-heroic mobster in that same series’ second season, and the other night, I saw him as a villain in Mission: Impossible. I’ve become a fan of Lin McCarthy but have yet to see him play a villain. He’s been an air force intelligence agent and an army officer in The Invaders, then a man whose daughter got kidnapped by a mobster in Mission: Impossible. I’d like to see any villainous roles he may have played. And it’s the same with Dabney Coleman. He’s in an episode of The Invaders as an air force officer who sees one of the aliens “expiring”. I remember him as Chief Quimby in Inspector Gadget. I’ve seen a few other roles of his, but I don’t know if I’ve seen him as a villain. There are a few actors I only recall seeing in heroic roles: Dirk Benedict, Don Johnson and Peter Graves come to mind. I’d like to see any villainous roles they’ve played.
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Sept 25, 2024 9:23:06 GMT -5
I'm also reminded of actor Raymond Burr. Many of his early roles he played a menacing gangster type. His best evil character was in Hitchcock's 1954 Rear Window. Once the TV show Perry Mason began in 1957 it all changed for him
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Sept 25, 2024 9:34:07 GMT -5
I get a real kick watching lead actors who are associated with Good Guy roles, showing their range by playing the villains Henry Fonda , for instance, in 1968's Once Upon A Time In The West Fred MacMurray in 1944's Double Indemnity John Wayne as Genghis Khan in 1956's The Conqueror Actually, that last one makes me giggle There are a few actors I only recall seeing in heroic roles: Dirk Benedict, Don Johnson and Peter Graves come to mind. I’d like to see any villainous roles they’ve played. Peter Graves played a baddie in the classic The Night Of The Hunter (1955). Not the main bad guy, that was Robert Mitchum, but a baddie thru and thru
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