Threads
1984
🎯 Verdict
✍️ Full Review
This could've been Jidu Krishnamurthi and Bertrand Russell's favorite horror movie. Harrowingly pro-nuclear-disarmament. Hard to believe in 42 long years, we have gotten to A House of Dynamite from this. The juxtaposition between daily lives going about their ways and the information seeping through television sets while bureaucratic and political machineries flipping through war manuals makes this even more horrifying to watch. First, Threads puts quite a bit of effort by attempting to identify with the common public by showing couples playing house while subtly inserting the exposition via media in the background so as to what horror is imminent very soon. Then, the collapse of societies aren't rushed by dropping off the warheads rather with step by step processes. Frenzied shopping, looting, chaos in the streets, rioting, people fleeing frantically, helpless and clueless government etc. came later. The latter parts were unspeakably gross as those were heartrending. The explosion, the fallout, the aftermath, how soon a civilization teeming with life and advanced modern technology reverts to prehistoric era basic survival instincts, yet all this in Threads mostly shown through the eyes of two families and a group of government officials buried alive under the detritus of the blast. Although the thorough minute by minute rundown by voiceover announcements like it's History channel and the visual typing aids I could have managed without.