The Day After (1983)

YouTube ^ | November 4, 2016 | Tuxedo

[Tuxedo]

I remember watching this Live on television in 1983. I find it especially upsetting the way Obama and Hillary keep saying things about Donald Trump and his finger on the button, when they are engaged in sabre-rattling with Russia. Maybe they need to take a look at this movie again. I was in Hiroshima a month ago and went to the Peace Park and Museum. What I saw there will never leave my mind. I fear seriously for our future if Hillary gets elected.

[Bryanw92]

>>It was an anti-Reagan propaganda piece

and it cost him the election in 1984 too!

Oh wait....no it didn’t. He won bigly! Because people wanted to defeat the nation that would do that to us. If it was anti-Reagan propaganda, it was the worst attempt ever.

[Tenega]

The most memorable thing to me about the movie was the musical score. Most of its viewers were probably unaware it was built around the tune to an old hymn, “How Firm a Foundation.” The fourth verse of the hymn says:

When through fiery trials your pathway shall lie
My grace, all sufficient, shall be your supply.
The fire shall not harm you. I only design
Your dross to consume and your gold to refine.

[BeadCounter]

Obama and Clinton have gotten a lot of people killed, in Libya, in Iraq and Syria, their irresponsibility saw the rise of ISIS.

Trump has done nothing Obama, the Clintons or Bush 43 did.

[windcliff]

lol

[daltec]

You may be talking about "Threads." It truly was harrowing and harder-hitting than The Day After. But even The Day After really made me think.

People can make fun of the acting all they want, but those scenes of searching for loved ones in a stadium full of grievously wounded people, or of that guy saying "Get out of my house!" to the starving family, and his house is nothing but charred rubble, and they silently offer food to him, well, they were pretty powerful when I first saw them when I was like 14, and like I said, they still make me think now.

Really brought home the utter hopelessness of it all.

[tuffydoodle]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AtBqYlez0bU

Here’s some clips from Testament. Lots of well known people in it. The boy from Airplane! The little boy in Witness.

[KarlInOhio]

Was that Threads?

Way scarier than The Day After.

[Ronniesque]

“Threads” was the name of that one.

[BenLurkin]

Sure, I saw it in 83

Didn’t learn anything. Already had a pretty good understanding of how potent nukes are.

Your best bet is to be one of those FReepers posting via satellite from the latrine in his outhouse, getting ready to draw well water to mix with some home-brew corn squeezings.

And I’m not joking.

[Tuxedo]

I haven’t seen Threads, but have heard it is better. If any of you ever get to Japan and can visit Hiroshima, it’s worth going there. I didn’t feel guilt, but I did feel sorrow and shock. War Games was supposedly based on a true event. I also agree at the time, I was so engrossed in the movie that I didn’t much notice the acting. Watching it again, you notice stuff like that... different times. I have been thinking about showing it to my kids so they can see the generation I grew up in and the fears we had.

[lightman]

The most memorable thing to me about the movie was the musical score. Most of its viewers were probably unaware it was built around the tune to an old hymn, “How Firm a Foundation.”

The version used for the film was part of a larger work by Virgil Thompson titled "The Plough the Broke the Plains"--the irony of plowshares into swords shattering the peaceful plains of Nebraska.

[Ronniesque]

Does anyone remember an HBO movie called “By Dawn’s Early Light” with Martin Landau, Powers Boothe, Rebecca De Mornay, James Earl Jones and others?

[samtheman]

Pro-nuclear freeze propaganda

And yes, it failed

[Ronniesque]

Rip Torn was in that too.

[DouglasKC]

This was a leftist scare movie aimed at Ronald Reagan. The meme back then was that Reagan was going to get us into nuclear war...

[BenLurkin]

[BenLurkin]

And even worse writing.

[Publius]

"Testament" was a wonderful film. It was based on a short story from the early Sixties that was published in "St. Anthony's Messenger," a religious magazine, and then reprinted in a more mainstream magazine in the Seventies.

It was both depressing and uplifting at the same time. It was about how people cope.

[Tuxedo]

In Reagan’s memoirs, he did admit the movie deeply saddened him.

[Impala64ssa]

Yes, the acting was so horrible how could you forget about it? Great material for Mystery Science Theater 3000. During that same time, tyhe early 80’s remember the No Nukes concerts? They were the brainchild of Jackson Browne and John Hall, former lead singer of Orleans (still the One, Dance With Me) and my former Cong from NY. They were done to “raise awareness” of the dangers of nuclear proliferation, particularly under the eeevil Reagan regime. Springsteen, Sting, the Talking Heads, U2, Pat Benetar an up and coming Madonna and just about everyone who was someone then performed at these venues. Now that the madmen in Iran and N Korea are well on their ways to develop nukes of their own, perhaps it’s time to resurrect these concerts to warn a new generation of the dangers of a potential nuclear holocaust? ((((((crickets chirping))))))))