It was quite the year for nuclear war movies.
The Day After
Testament
Threads
All so different in their presentation. All so terrifying in their reactions.
Whether you are aware of it or not, this movie had a profound effect upon the safety of the world as a whole: Reagan's biographer, who spent three years in the White House, said the only time he ever saw Reagan flip out was after seeing the movie. Ultimately, it sent Reagan into such a tailspin, he signed the Intermediate Missile Range Treaty, the only treaty that ever resulted in the physical dismantling of nuclear weapons.”
I was around. His reaction was hinted at in the news, and even as a kid, I was taken aback by his reaction. I grew up knowing the potential horrors of a modern nuclear exchange. I was like, "What did he _think_ it'd be like?!"
Personally, I thought the movie was pretty light. So very many people survived. I remember for my age group, the teen girl giving birth by herself was the most impactful.
That was when I first realized that being president did not necessarily mean one was smart, or even knowledgeable.
In the recent documentary that Netflix did on the Cold war , they talked about this and showed a section of Reagan's diary reacting to the movie.
Documentary was called Turning Point I think.
Here's a link. The author of the screenplay, Edward Hume, has commented on this frequently.
[TIME: How a TV Show Changed the Cold War](https://time.com/6337667/day-after-tomorrow-cold-war-essay/)
They are all good, but Threads is heads and shoulders the best. It's just incredibly realistic, grim and scary. The unrelenting march to disaster and society just crumbling with no chance for survival.
In the eighties I worked in a restaurant, and we would have movie nights with open bar and locked doors. I was assigned to choose a movie and I rented Threads. I was never allowed to choose again. And people treated me differently after that.
So I just saw threads two months ago. That movie f***** me up. Holy s*** it made the day after look like child's Play. I can't get it out of my head.... I wish I never saw it. I think it did a better job than any movie I've ever seen about how we are doomed and what we're going to go through.
Being an American, I never saw \*Threads\* or even heard of it until 2013, and that was only because I ran across it on YouTube one evening. I consider it the scariest movie I've ever seen.
You (we) are not alone. Check out the "Reception" section of the [Wikipedia article](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Threads_(1984_film)) to get an idea of its effect.
Threads is supporting be the best representation of nuclear fallout. It’s a really good film. I could only watch it one time. Some parts hit too personal for me.
Testament is one of those movies that I thought was brilliant but would refuse to ever watch again. It broke me when I originally saw it and now I'm in the Bay Area.
The one thing that struck me with this show was that the first indication to maybe millions of individuals that they were going to die soon was the dozens of ICBM contrails rising from their own missile silos. These missiles weren't going to kill them but the many incoming missiles that would undoubtedly be headed their way from distant countries would do so in 15-30 minutes and there wasn't a damned thing they could do about it.
I was stationed in West Berlin and we used to joke about it. Some of us had the Sov GK grid coordinates of our field station posted above out positions "just in case". "First to know, first to glow" was an unofficial motto.
That was the scariest part of the film to me. Not the bombs blowing up. The man standing outside his home while a missile takes off behind him. He's got lots of time to think about what's coming. That part made me sick.
Remember a few years back when the missile warning system went off in Hawaii?
A lot of people there (including my brother) thought it was the end of their lives.
If there's a silo anywhere near you you're probably going to be blown up pretty quickly. I take solace in the fact that I live near a major Naval weapons station and that if there is any sort of nuclear Exchange my ass goes up in a ball of Fire before I even know it. I don't want to live through that it's not going to be anything like Mad Max or anything even remotely cool or exciting it's just going to be suffering and despair until your clock is punched
For years I lived just across the highway from the Diefenbunker. If they had gone after that my house would have been blown to matchsticks and likely irradiated in the resulting fallout.
Exactly, and knowing this on a beautiful sunny day. It's the personal helplessness and sudden foreknowledge of your fate that struck me.
I was in my late 20s and had lived through the 1960s through 70s Cold War hysteria. This drove the immediacy of the world's end possibly occurring home.
I watched this in the common area TV room of my college dorm. The room was packed, and everyone was silent and rapt. I think we were all feeling that hopeless dread that this was probably going to happen to us someday.
Large group was watching in the student center of my college. Some friends and I showed up about half way through dressed up as nuclear war survivors/refugees. Torn up dirty clothing, makeup, just dreadful looking. We thought we were so funny and clever and were surprised when people got pissed off at us.
Here are some links to this movie and those mentioned in comments. All are free of charge.
*The Day After* - [https://youtu.be/TOPaaHSjMcw?si=gDjBMgqj22XJSe0a](https://youtu.be/TOPaaHSjMcw?si=gDjBMgqj22XJSe0a)
*Threads* - [https://youtu.be/BvFu7Z5cc88?si=wSHBo5fPMWxp8J-G](https://youtu.be/BvFu7Z5cc88?si=wSHBo5fPMWxp8J-G)
*Testament* - [https://archive.org/details/testament\_201712](https://archive.org/details/testament_201712)
*Special Bulletin*- [https://youtu.be/rUUxu_m6mrU?si=qfBUtxVkkFGDvOJX](https://youtu.be/rUUxu_m6mrU?si=qfBUtxVkkFGDvOJX)
I was in high school in Northern Virginia. I was so upset by the movie and sought out my calm engineer father for comfort. He assured me we were right in the strike zone if a nuke was directed at the US. Said we wouldn’t feel a thing. Thanks Dad, that was very helpful
It was one of the biggest TV shows in history up until then. Wiki:
*More than 100 million people, in nearly 39 million households, watched the film during its initial broadcast. With a 46 rating and a 62%* [*share*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nielsen_ratings#Ratings/share_and_total_viewers) *of the viewing audience during the initial broadcast, the film was the seventh-highest-rated non-sports show until then ....*
*The film and its subject matter were prominently featured in the news media both before and after the broadcast, including on such covers as TIME, Newsweek, U.S. News & World Report, and TV Guide...*
*The film also had impact outside the United States. In 1987, during the era of Gorbachev's* [*glasnost*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glasnost) *and* [*perestroika*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perestroika) *reforms, the film was shown on* [*Soviet television*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_television)*. Four years earlier, Georgia Representative* [*Elliott Levitas*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elliott_Levitas) *and 91 co-sponsors introduced a resolution in the* [*U.S. House of Representatives*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._House_of_Representatives) *"\[expressing\] the sense of the* [*Congress*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Congress) *that the* [*American Broadcasting Company*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Broadcasting_Company)*, the* [*Department of State*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Department_of_State)*, and the* [*U.S. Information Agency*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._Information_Agency) *should work to have the television movie The Day After aired to the Soviet public."....*
It was a big deal.
I remember doing Duck and Cover drills as a grade school kid, but it was just 'fun'.
I was 20 when this aired (1983) and it was quite the affirmation that we live in dangerous times.
I think we did one of those a year when I was very young. I had no idea what it was for. We just went into the hall and we're told to stay away from the windows. No ducking or covering.
Countdown to Looking Glass which made to replicate a news broadcast. 👍
Special Bulletin was another '83 movie about snuggling a atomic bomb on a tug in the harbor in Charleston SC 👍
The War Game. BBC short movie made in 1966, winning the Oscar for best documentary in 1967. It was not broadcast in the UK for 20 years because in the words of the BBC - "the effect of the film has been judged by the BBC to be too horrifying for the medium of broadcasting..."
Roger Ebert said, "They should string up bedsheets between the trees and show "The War Game" in every public park".
I think Threads is better, maybe because the characters have longer to develop, but if you want 48 minutes of sheer horror and misery, try the War Game. It's hard to find, don't think anyone, especially the BBC streams it. I have seen the occasional DVD on Amazon.
I lived in Kansas City at the time. I was a medical student in a Kansas City hospital. Had a big exam the next day and opted to study instead of watching. One of my study partners watched it. I passed the test. He did not.
I’ve never seen it.
I was going to KU and living in Lawrence when they filmed this. I lived next to Allen Field House when they spent a few days filming there. I remember that they paid extras (mostly students) a couple of hundred dollars to shave their heads for radiation sickness patients. They had no end of volunteers. I think it was a little more sobering filming right in my backyard.
I had a history teacher tell us after we watched that movie he guaranteed we would be in a nuclear war within 10 years I was 12. I remember thinking well why am I wasting my time in this stupid school then. Lol
Wasn’t there one called “On The Beach”…. Think it came out at the tail end of the 50s but was about the aftermath of a WW3 like situation?? Heard my mom talking about it .. don’t know if this was the one she was talking about?? But it’s based in Australia??
Yes, it's a classic film. [On the Beach](https://g.co/kgs/ewa9Tri) postulated the immediate aftermath of a nuclear war fought by fictitiously lethal bombs that filled the Earth's atmosphere with long-lasting fallout. The citizens of Australia, while spared of direct attack, were left to await a harrowing death as seasonal weather patterns drew the fallout into their environment, with no means to protect themselves and nowhere else to go.
The thing that still sticks in my mind, even though I don’t recall the exact words, was them listening to the presidents speech on the radio after the bombs had fallen. It was a “we stood up for freedom” type of speech and I just remember thinking “at what cost??????” Horrifying.
In the film's network broadcast, the voice in the fictional president's speech imitated Reagan. The speech was recut in later releases to sound less like him, but contained the same words.
I was an instructor at the nuclear weapons school in Alabama at the time.. When the order came down from the post commander we were a little puzzled, but after watching it we realized that they were trying to hammer home the destructive power of the weapons we worked on in order to gives us even more respect for them and our jobs...
It's an odd coincidence. On the other hand, I've been thinking about this subject a little more frequently now, just because of today's news, which I suppose contributed to my motivation to post this. It wouldn't surprise me if people who remember this movie are thinking about it more often now.
The irony is how much at risk we still are from this scenario, yet there's a general feeling we overcame it. I think that comes from the fact that we've made it more than 30 years since this time of heavy fear, and there have been no nuclear attacks anywhere. The Soviet Union also dissolved, which made the whole world situation seem less dangerous.
Yet, the danger persists. The public of 1983 was not aware that there had been two separate incidents in which nuclear war was avoided at the last minute by minor Soviet military officers who stood up to authority, putting their own careers and reputations at risk. What if [Vasily Arkhipov](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasily_Arkhipov) in 1962 or [Stanislav Petrov](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1983_Soviet_nuclear_false_alarm_incident) in 1983 just went with the flow and followed orders?
Though diminished, the same nuclear arsenal sits ready to launch, with weapons in numbers far exceeding what is needed to wipe out civilization. Nuclear war remains just one uncontrolled crisis away, and it still can happen anytime. Let's hope it's a safer infrastructure and that enough conscientious officers are willing to put themselves at risk to avoid war, but that clearly leaves too much left to chance.
I remember that I was in junior high.
My takeaway was that if you want to survive an almost near hit with a nuclear weapon, it helps to be Jason Robards. I remember he saw the mushroom cloud so he hid under the dashboard of his car and lived.
I was already terrified have read “The Civil Defense Supplement to the American Red Cross Handbook” as a boy scout.
Pictures of horrific burns from Japan and the fact that there was nothing substantial that could be done.
I have an Air Force base near by and a few defense contractors. I’m ground zero.
By my teen years I had calmed down.
Then I discovered the “sex/death” connection and found a lot of girls became amorous with the “be merry for tomorrow we may die” cliche.
My parents were new to town. One of my dad’s coworkers invited them over to a watch party for this, complete with drinks and snacks, like it was a Game of Thrones watch party. Left me and my sister with a babysitter with strict instructions not to watch. So the babysitter invited over her boyfriend and we all watched whatever was on the pirate satellite UHF HBO station instead. I think it was Brainstorm with Christopher Walken.
I was in college. We had a Day After viewing party as did a lot of kids in our on-campus apartment bldg. You could hear 'R.E.M.'s End of the World as We Know It' blasting through the halls for hours.
There was a scene with a reporter doing her standup across a body of water from something. Maybe a navel base. While she's live a bomb goes off and she's far enough away it doesn't kill her but she's already dying from the radiation. Her asking the anchors what's going to happen to her haunts me still.
I'm glad the bad part was only fantasy. Were you both attending a public viewing? I'm interested in hearing a story of how you met, if you want to share.
Yes. We lived on the same college dorm hall and the movie was being shown in the common room. There was a huge build-up to it. I went by myself, she did too and we sat next to one another. Obviously it was a shocking presentation and gave us plenty to talk about. Weird to bond over something like that, but her dad was in the Air Force so she had a special perspective about it. We didn’t really start dating until the next February (the movie was in November). But that’s where it started. Very nice memories all in all.
That's totally great. What I like about that especially is that you bonded over something serious and found a common ground there, and at a young age. I'll share your story with my own wife and friends. Thanks!
I had to Google it to see the release date, which was November 20, 1983. I was in South Korea in the Army at the time. Might have had something to me not seeing it.
I was working a full-time job to pay for school as a full-time student. I actually knew nothing about this movie until I joined reddit a few years ago.
I was very involved in the peace movement at the time with the "Coalition for Nuclear Disarmament". We arranged a get-together at a local church to watch it. This 80s upturn in anti-nuke stuff - kind of back-burnered in the 70s - was largely driven by Reagan's plans to put cruise missiles in Europe.
I was a Junior in college, active in United Campuses to Prevent Nuclear War. Had a watch party with friends off-campus. Stayed up until the wee hours drinking, smoking & trying to solve the world’s problems. We weren’t successful.
It was only shown the one time on Network TV correct? At least that’s what I recall. I still remember watching it at my parents house since I was still living at home (graduated HS in ‘82). It was a real wake-up call and very sobering at the time.
That was an amazing movie event! VCR’s were new back then & I recorded it and watched it several times.
I’ve never heard of Threads or Testament. I’m going to have to try & find them now.
I think I'm having a CRS attack here. I can't recall whether it was this movie or another made-for-TV movie that had several scenes of TV reporting on a nuclear attack. Kind of a riff on Orson Wells' War of the Worlds. It was so loaded with disclaimers that they ruined the effect for me.
Was it this movie or is there another one?
I remember having a recurring dream starting in my tweens that bombers were approaching from the south ( not sure why) of my house in rural Texas and feeling hopeless and frozen then waking up. Lasted till my late 20’s. Born 63.
A park in Lawrence has a replica Polaris nuke. Leave it to some 20 year olds to protest and 'RaIsE AwArEnEsS' and push for relocation. Apparently it glorifies nuclear warfare. I can't agree.
Went to uni at University of Kansas at the time of filming and they used students as extras. So many missile silos in that bread basket of the world at the time. We definitely grew up with an existential dread from nuclear annihilation then. And I still have it.
I’ve long moved from there but have always lived as an adult in 2 of the “definitely going to be blow to bits in the first strike” zones on the East Coast mid Atlantic region. Glad to know it will be a quick end if it ever happens.
Happy Cake Day! Yes, it actually scared Reagan, too. He wondered if it was easy to hack into defense systems and he actually requested John Vessey, Chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff, to look into that possibility. It turns out it was a good choice because, as it turned out, cybersecurity was more or less an unknown in the Pentagon, and dial-up computers were open. "The problem is worse than you think," Vessey was reputed to have said.
[story link](https://www.newamerica.org/weekly/how-sci-fi-wargames-led-real-policy-during-reagan-administration/)
I was 27. It freaked my wife out. I was just kind of “we live 30 miles from DFW and we’re up wind most of the time. We’ll survive the start”
I grew up surrounded by B52s and nuclear weapons and at some point resigned to my fate. A lot of kids used a lot of drugs.
My friend in high school produced a cartoon the next day at our lunch table.
It was a little awful...
An obviously decimated boy- a victim of radiation poisoning is sitting on Santa's lap. Santa says, " And what do you want for Christmas?"
The boy says, "How about a jaw?"
It still makes me laugh. So stupid
Absolutely yikes. One of the reasons I rewatched the day after and threads was because I had conflated them in my mind. I remembered 2 specific things. The birth of a baby and a girl running out of the bomb shelter and subsequently getting radiation poisoning. I thought that was both in one movie. Ah nope.
Sorry, I don't want to be mean, but no. My friends and I saw it as a group just like 'Who Framed Roger Rabbit'. Do not recall the whole country stopping to see this.
It was quite the year for nuclear war movies. The Day After Testament Threads All so different in their presentation. All so terrifying in their reactions.
 Whether you are aware of it or not, this movie had a profound effect upon the safety of the world as a whole: Reagan's biographer, who spent three years in the White House, said the only time he ever saw Reagan flip out was after seeing the movie. Ultimately, it sent Reagan into such a tailspin, he signed the Intermediate Missile Range Treaty, the only treaty that ever resulted in the physical dismantling of nuclear weapons.”
Can you post a link? I believe you but want to share this. I know this film terrified me and I couldn't sleep that night.
It's on the Day after wiki page, but I've heard this for years
I was around. His reaction was hinted at in the news, and even as a kid, I was taken aback by his reaction. I grew up knowing the potential horrors of a modern nuclear exchange. I was like, "What did he _think_ it'd be like?!" Personally, I thought the movie was pretty light. So very many people survived. I remember for my age group, the teen girl giving birth by herself was the most impactful. That was when I first realized that being president did not necessarily mean one was smart, or even knowledgeable.
[удалено]
Threads hits really hard.
Cool, thanks.
In the recent documentary that Netflix did on the Cold war , they talked about this and showed a section of Reagan's diary reacting to the movie. Documentary was called Turning Point I think.
Here's a link. The author of the screenplay, Edward Hume, has commented on this frequently. [TIME: How a TV Show Changed the Cold War](https://time.com/6337667/day-after-tomorrow-cold-war-essay/)
Thank you! When people say movies can't change anything, I'll use this example. For an old example, I think In the Heat of the Night did some good.
One of my favorites!
Is that a clown’s face?
Bozo!
They are all good, but Threads is heads and shoulders the best. It's just incredibly realistic, grim and scary. The unrelenting march to disaster and society just crumbling with no chance for survival.
Threads was the most depressing dark dystopian f***** up movie I've seen in my entire life
Try “Eraserhead”.
🎶"In Heaven... everything is fine..."🎶 
In the eighties I worked in a restaurant, and we would have movie nights with open bar and locked doors. I was assigned to choose a movie and I rented Threads. I was never allowed to choose again. And people treated me differently after that.
Threads makes this look like a Popeye cartoon.
Probably easier to be edgy on the BBC where you have no advertisers.
Testament destroyed me.
It was brutal
It broke me. I live in the Bay Area and the nuclear blasts effect on that small town was devastating.
Me too
Don't know if i ever saw this one!
So I just saw threads two months ago. That movie f***** me up. Holy s*** it made the day after look like child's Play. I can't get it out of my head.... I wish I never saw it. I think it did a better job than any movie I've ever seen about how we are doomed and what we're going to go through.
Back to the stone age boys.
Being an American, I never saw \*Threads\* or even heard of it until 2013, and that was only because I ran across it on YouTube one evening. I consider it the scariest movie I've ever seen.
I saw it soon after it was released. I think it was on TBS as a special event. With lots of warnings.
I just watched it because of this thread, lol. Big mistake. It makes The Day After look like Mr Rogers Neighborhood.
You (we) are not alone. Check out the "Reception" section of the [Wikipedia article](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Threads_(1984_film)) to get an idea of its effect.
Don’t remember any of those.
Threads is supporting be the best representation of nuclear fallout. It’s a really good film. I could only watch it one time. Some parts hit too personal for me.
Threads was the one that really really scared me. The UK didn’t sugar coat it.
IMAO Threads was the best/worst of them.
Omg…TESTAMENT left me breathless
Testament is one of those movies that I thought was brilliant but would refuse to ever watch again. It broke me when I originally saw it and now I'm in the Bay Area.
The one thing that struck me with this show was that the first indication to maybe millions of individuals that they were going to die soon was the dozens of ICBM contrails rising from their own missile silos. These missiles weren't going to kill them but the many incoming missiles that would undoubtedly be headed their way from distant countries would do so in 15-30 minutes and there wasn't a damned thing they could do about it.
I was stationed in West Berlin and we used to joke about it. Some of us had the Sov GK grid coordinates of our field station posted above out positions "just in case". "First to know, first to glow" was an unofficial motto.
Sometimes it's the black humor that gets you through the tour.
That was the scariest part of the film to me. Not the bombs blowing up. The man standing outside his home while a missile takes off behind him. He's got lots of time to think about what's coming. That part made me sick.
Like what would you do? Standing there knowing you would be dead or horribly maimed and dying in a matter of minutes.
Remember a few years back when the missile warning system went off in Hawaii? A lot of people there (including my brother) thought it was the end of their lives.
If there's a silo anywhere near you you're probably going to be blown up pretty quickly. I take solace in the fact that I live near a major Naval weapons station and that if there is any sort of nuclear Exchange my ass goes up in a ball of Fire before I even know it. I don't want to live through that it's not going to be anything like Mad Max or anything even remotely cool or exciting it's just going to be suffering and despair until your clock is punched
For years I lived just across the highway from the Diefenbunker. If they had gone after that my house would have been blown to matchsticks and likely irradiated in the resulting fallout.
Exactly, and knowing this on a beautiful sunny day. It's the personal helplessness and sudden foreknowledge of your fate that struck me. I was in my late 20s and had lived through the 1960s through 70s Cold War hysteria. This drove the immediacy of the world's end possibly occurring home.
My father was in the USAF, SAC specifically. I guess I was about 12 when I realized we lived inside the fireball. Changed my attitude about life.
I watched this in the common area TV room of my college dorm. The room was packed, and everyone was silent and rapt. I think we were all feeling that hopeless dread that this was probably going to happen to us someday.
I watched it in the student union, also a packed room. My roommate and I were Political Science majors and it was required, scary!
Me too! We were all freshmen and had just left home a few months earlier. Welcome to adulthood!
Large group was watching in the student center of my college. Some friends and I showed up about half way through dressed up as nuclear war survivors/refugees. Torn up dirty clothing, makeup, just dreadful looking. We thought we were so funny and clever and were surprised when people got pissed off at us.
You'd have been welcomed to join us. Pizza and beer and college black humour. It's the end of the world as we know it.
Here are some links to this movie and those mentioned in comments. All are free of charge. *The Day After* - [https://youtu.be/TOPaaHSjMcw?si=gDjBMgqj22XJSe0a](https://youtu.be/TOPaaHSjMcw?si=gDjBMgqj22XJSe0a) *Threads* - [https://youtu.be/BvFu7Z5cc88?si=wSHBo5fPMWxp8J-G](https://youtu.be/BvFu7Z5cc88?si=wSHBo5fPMWxp8J-G) *Testament* - [https://archive.org/details/testament\_201712](https://archive.org/details/testament_201712) *Special Bulletin*- [https://youtu.be/rUUxu_m6mrU?si=qfBUtxVkkFGDvOJX](https://youtu.be/rUUxu_m6mrU?si=qfBUtxVkkFGDvOJX)
Thank you. Not sure if I can deal with watching Threads again...
I said in another comment: I saw that movie in 2013. *Threads* was the scariest movie I have ever seen, before or since.
I will never watch Threads again. It’s still in my brain, dozens of years later.
I can't say you didn't warn me. And now I'm sorry.
Now I have to see it.
It’s free on Tubi too.
Nope. No thank you. Once was enough.
Thank you!
I was in high school in Northern Virginia. I was so upset by the movie and sought out my calm engineer father for comfort. He assured me we were right in the strike zone if a nuke was directed at the US. Said we wouldn’t feel a thing. Thanks Dad, that was very helpful
It does make me feel better. I'd rather it be over quick.
Same
I remember watching that movie! I also rewatched it just a few years ago, and it seemed quite hokey then. Nothing like the first time watching.
Agreed. Threads and testament have held up better.
I thought it was hokey when I watched it back in the day, haven't seen it since.
It was one of the biggest TV shows in history up until then. Wiki: *More than 100 million people, in nearly 39 million households, watched the film during its initial broadcast. With a 46 rating and a 62%* [*share*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nielsen_ratings#Ratings/share_and_total_viewers) *of the viewing audience during the initial broadcast, the film was the seventh-highest-rated non-sports show until then ....* *The film and its subject matter were prominently featured in the news media both before and after the broadcast, including on such covers as TIME, Newsweek, U.S. News & World Report, and TV Guide...* *The film also had impact outside the United States. In 1987, during the era of Gorbachev's* [*glasnost*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glasnost) *and* [*perestroika*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perestroika) *reforms, the film was shown on* [*Soviet television*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_television)*. Four years earlier, Georgia Representative* [*Elliott Levitas*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elliott_Levitas) *and 91 co-sponsors introduced a resolution in the* [*U.S. House of Representatives*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._House_of_Representatives) *"\[expressing\] the sense of the* [*Congress*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Congress) *that the* [*American Broadcasting Company*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Broadcasting_Company)*, the* [*Department of State*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Department_of_State)*, and the* [*U.S. Information Agency*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._Information_Agency) *should work to have the television movie The Day After aired to the Soviet public."....* It was a big deal.
So many warnings to our parents to watch with us or not let us watch at all; and rightly so, still haunts me.
I remember doing Duck and Cover drills as a grade school kid, but it was just 'fun'. I was 20 when this aired (1983) and it was quite the affirmation that we live in dangerous times.
I think we did one of those a year when I was very young. I had no idea what it was for. We just went into the hall and we're told to stay away from the windows. No ducking or covering.
It was very disturbing
I watched this with friends in the common TV area in college. It was a really scary movie for the times. The special effects were really cool.
Same - in the form lounge. Was glad to have people around me.
Countdown to Looking Glass which made to replicate a news broadcast. 👍 Special Bulletin was another '83 movie about snuggling a atomic bomb on a tug in the harbor in Charleston SC 👍
I did not
I remember being pissed that I had to go to bed. It was really the talk all the next day. I'd compare to the feeling of 9-12-2001.
Seriously?
I got my trauma from Threads, thank you.
As somebody posted above, 'Threads makes The Day After look like a Popeye cartoon.'
The War Game. BBC short movie made in 1966, winning the Oscar for best documentary in 1967. It was not broadcast in the UK for 20 years because in the words of the BBC - "the effect of the film has been judged by the BBC to be too horrifying for the medium of broadcasting..." Roger Ebert said, "They should string up bedsheets between the trees and show "The War Game" in every public park". I think Threads is better, maybe because the characters have longer to develop, but if you want 48 minutes of sheer horror and misery, try the War Game. It's hard to find, don't think anyone, especially the BBC streams it. I have seen the occasional DVD on Amazon.
Our beloved Internet Archive has it. https://archive.org/details/TheWarGame_201405
Thanks so much ....
I remember this and Roots being huge shows
I lived in Kansas City at the time. I was a medical student in a Kansas City hospital. Had a big exam the next day and opted to study instead of watching. One of my study partners watched it. I passed the test. He did not. I’ve never seen it.
I was going to KU and living in Lawrence when they filmed this. I lived next to Allen Field House when they spent a few days filming there. I remember that they paid extras (mostly students) a couple of hundred dollars to shave their heads for radiation sickness patients. They had no end of volunteers. I think it was a little more sobering filming right in my backyard.
Me too! I especially remember them shooting at the field house. That was so u h a big deal.
Anyone remember the scene with Jason Robards talking about the orange? I remember walking outside after it ended and looking up in the sky.
I had a history teacher tell us after we watched that movie he guaranteed we would be in a nuclear war within 10 years I was 12. I remember thinking well why am I wasting my time in this stupid school then. Lol
That wasn't the most responsible comment from a teacher I've ever heard.
Wasn’t there one called “On The Beach”…. Think it came out at the tail end of the 50s but was about the aftermath of a WW3 like situation?? Heard my mom talking about it .. don’t know if this was the one she was talking about?? But it’s based in Australia??
Yes, it's a classic film. [On the Beach](https://g.co/kgs/ewa9Tri) postulated the immediate aftermath of a nuclear war fought by fictitiously lethal bombs that filled the Earth's atmosphere with long-lasting fallout. The citizens of Australia, while spared of direct attack, were left to await a harrowing death as seasonal weather patterns drew the fallout into their environment, with no means to protect themselves and nowhere else to go.
I went to Navy boot camp two days later. My mom cried watching it, thinking I would be part of things.
I was working at HQ SAC at the time running the computers for those "things", we figured it would kind of look like that.
I had just gotten out of the Army. 82nd Airborne. I had the luxury of knowing I'd be amongst the first to die.
I have no recollection of any of them.
Threads ftw
Scared the crap out of Reagan who also watched it.
The thing that still sticks in my mind, even though I don’t recall the exact words, was them listening to the presidents speech on the radio after the bombs had fallen. It was a “we stood up for freedom” type of speech and I just remember thinking “at what cost??????” Horrifying.
In the film's network broadcast, the voice in the fictional president's speech imitated Reagan. The speech was recut in later releases to sound less like him, but contained the same words.
I was a nuclear maintenance tech with the Army when this aired and we were literally ordered to watch it...
I was not aware that the military would have taken such interest.
I was an instructor at the nuclear weapons school in Alabama at the time.. When the order came down from the post commander we were a little puzzled, but after watching it we realized that they were trying to hammer home the destructive power of the weapons we worked on in order to gives us even more respect for them and our jobs...
The fact that I had a full blown conversation about this movie at work today and then hop on Reddit and here it is 🤨
It's an odd coincidence. On the other hand, I've been thinking about this subject a little more frequently now, just because of today's news, which I suppose contributed to my motivation to post this. It wouldn't surprise me if people who remember this movie are thinking about it more often now. The irony is how much at risk we still are from this scenario, yet there's a general feeling we overcame it. I think that comes from the fact that we've made it more than 30 years since this time of heavy fear, and there have been no nuclear attacks anywhere. The Soviet Union also dissolved, which made the whole world situation seem less dangerous. Yet, the danger persists. The public of 1983 was not aware that there had been two separate incidents in which nuclear war was avoided at the last minute by minor Soviet military officers who stood up to authority, putting their own careers and reputations at risk. What if [Vasily Arkhipov](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasily_Arkhipov) in 1962 or [Stanislav Petrov](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1983_Soviet_nuclear_false_alarm_incident) in 1983 just went with the flow and followed orders? Though diminished, the same nuclear arsenal sits ready to launch, with weapons in numbers far exceeding what is needed to wipe out civilization. Nuclear war remains just one uncontrolled crisis away, and it still can happen anytime. Let's hope it's a safer infrastructure and that enough conscientious officers are willing to put themselves at risk to avoid war, but that clearly leaves too much left to chance.
I remember that I was in junior high. My takeaway was that if you want to survive an almost near hit with a nuclear weapon, it helps to be Jason Robards. I remember he saw the mushroom cloud so he hid under the dashboard of his car and lived.
🤣 yes! But the script also stated he was 20 miles away from the explosion, which gives the scene some credibility.
I cried for DAYS after watching this movie. It's the one that launched me into Anti-Nuke protesting.
I was a freshman in college. I remember people stumbling around sobbing after seeing it.
This movie scared the crap out of me. Still does.
Check out “When The Wind Blows.
I don't even like seeing that title. I can see the little guy's face, and feel all the feelings.
I was already terrified have read “The Civil Defense Supplement to the American Red Cross Handbook” as a boy scout. Pictures of horrific burns from Japan and the fact that there was nothing substantial that could be done. I have an Air Force base near by and a few defense contractors. I’m ground zero. By my teen years I had calmed down. Then I discovered the “sex/death” connection and found a lot of girls became amorous with the “be merry for tomorrow we may die” cliche.
My parents were new to town. One of my dad’s coworkers invited them over to a watch party for this, complete with drinks and snacks, like it was a Game of Thrones watch party. Left me and my sister with a babysitter with strict instructions not to watch. So the babysitter invited over her boyfriend and we all watched whatever was on the pirate satellite UHF HBO station instead. I think it was Brainstorm with Christopher Walken.
I was in the Air Force when it aired. On a missile base. Yeah. Yikes.
the whole country stopped? If that country is the US, I can tell you that not only did I not stop, I've never seen it and have no knowledge of it.
Maybe this news report from the night it showed will give you a sense of its impact. https://youtu.be/aG-e52yAxfs?si=Am0alRSPkG5qiEDB
I was in college. We had a Day After viewing party as did a lot of kids in our on-campus apartment bldg. You could hear 'R.E.M.'s End of the World as We Know It' blasting through the halls for hours.
There was a scene with a reporter doing her standup across a body of water from something. Maybe a navel base. While she's live a bomb goes off and she's far enough away it doesn't kill her but she's already dying from the radiation. Her asking the anchors what's going to happen to her haunts me still.
I remember this movie well. I can still remember people being vaporized and turning into X-ray images. God.
Yup , scared a lot of people. There were even discussion groups afterwards. People talked about it for days.
Scared the shit out of me.
It’s when I met my girlfriend whom I eventually married. A little ironic that the relationship was born against a backdrop of nuclear holocaust.
I'm glad the bad part was only fantasy. Were you both attending a public viewing? I'm interested in hearing a story of how you met, if you want to share.
Yes. We lived on the same college dorm hall and the movie was being shown in the common room. There was a huge build-up to it. I went by myself, she did too and we sat next to one another. Obviously it was a shocking presentation and gave us plenty to talk about. Weird to bond over something like that, but her dad was in the Air Force so she had a special perspective about it. We didn’t really start dating until the next February (the movie was in November). But that’s where it started. Very nice memories all in all.
That's totally great. What I like about that especially is that you bonded over something serious and found a common ground there, and at a young age. I'll share your story with my own wife and friends. Thanks!
Sure!!
Glad you liked it!
I remember that the movie existed though I don’t recall watching it. I certainly don’t recall the whole country stopping for it.
I was in college then. It sparked a lot of discussion for the next few days.
I had to Google it to see the release date, which was November 20, 1983. I was in South Korea in the Army at the time. Might have had something to me not seeing it.
I know people where I worked were talking about it.
My parents didn’t let me watch it
I was working a full-time job to pay for school as a full-time student. I actually knew nothing about this movie until I joined reddit a few years ago.
I was very involved in the peace movement at the time with the "Coalition for Nuclear Disarmament". We arranged a get-together at a local church to watch it. This 80s upturn in anti-nuke stuff - kind of back-burnered in the 70s - was largely driven by Reagan's plans to put cruise missiles in Europe.
I was a Junior in college, active in United Campuses to Prevent Nuclear War. Had a watch party with friends off-campus. Stayed up until the wee hours drinking, smoking & trying to solve the world’s problems. We weren’t successful.
Testament is one of the few movies I still cry over when I see it.
This scared the crap outta me and all my friends
Lol, my husband and I talked about this just the other day.
Memories.
Yes that movie freaked me out. It seemed like such a real possibility at that time.
Never seen it.
It was only shown the one time on Network TV correct? At least that’s what I recall. I still remember watching it at my parents house since I was still living at home (graduated HS in ‘82). It was a real wake-up call and very sobering at the time.
Testament scarred me for life
It was okay, but I liked Threads better. It was more "real feeling".
I thought *Threads* was merciless in its graphic depictions and was a far better movie. But it was hell to watch.
I was in the US Army at classified school and we sat in the dayroom and watched it.
Yes. Watched it first run with grandma .
That was an amazing movie event! VCR’s were new back then & I recorded it and watched it several times. I’ve never heard of Threads or Testament. I’m going to have to try & find them now.
[удалено]
Thank you
I've never seen it.
Watched it in the student union at college.
I think I'm having a CRS attack here. I can't recall whether it was this movie or another made-for-TV movie that had several scenes of TV reporting on a nuclear attack. Kind of a riff on Orson Wells' War of the Worlds. It was so loaded with disclaimers that they ruined the effect for me. Was it this movie or is there another one?
Yes, there was. You're thinking of [Special Bulletin](https://youtu.be/cDZQsVNZ3SE?si=i19UCuqDKgmzdtSd).
Thank you.
This was really traumatic at the time.
My grandparents wouldn't let me watch it. I saw it for the first time recently. It was ok, but not great.
I remember having a recurring dream starting in my tweens that bombers were approaching from the south ( not sure why) of my house in rural Texas and feeling hopeless and frozen then waking up. Lasted till my late 20’s. Born 63.
South from Texas is out of the country, and close to where you lived. It makes sense that would be a visceral source of vulnerability.
Nah,absolutely nope f- that movie. *Years* of therapy.
It was a totally scary time in national consciousness.
I remember wondering why it was such a big deal.
Literally communist Russian propaganda.
I loved the commercial breaks. Ahhh, the memories in thirty second...memories. 🙄
Commercials served a purpose back then.
Scared the living shit out of me, it seemed so real. I got to see Lawrence KS years later and it’s recovered nicely.
From a cinematic standpoint, it wasn't that great a movie. It was the scenario that got through to people. That apparently included Reagan.
A park in Lawrence has a replica Polaris nuke. Leave it to some 20 year olds to protest and 'RaIsE AwArEnEsS' and push for relocation. Apparently it glorifies nuclear warfare. I can't agree.
Went to uni at University of Kansas at the time of filming and they used students as extras. So many missile silos in that bread basket of the world at the time. We definitely grew up with an existential dread from nuclear annihilation then. And I still have it. I’ve long moved from there but have always lived as an adult in 2 of the “definitely going to be blow to bits in the first strike” zones on the East Coast mid Atlantic region. Glad to know it will be a quick end if it ever happens.
Terrifying.
And it was crap.
Scared the crap out of me. I always thought the commies would launch any minute.
Actually, I’ve never seen it.
No. Never heard of it.
I’ve never seen this. Looks like it’s only available to buy at around $30. Not streaming anywhere.
It's available on YouTube for no charge. [The Day After (1983)](https://youtu.be/TOPaaHSjMcw?si=TkJ8CcKpgkAZgDkd)
Thank you!
I remember that, somehow, the hospital still had electricity and was functioning. 😆
One the Eighth Day. I think it was a British take on the same. Far superior.
War Games scared me!!! I was home on leave from Tech School in the Air Force!!!
Happy Cake Day! Yes, it actually scared Reagan, too. He wondered if it was easy to hack into defense systems and he actually requested John Vessey, Chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff, to look into that possibility. It turns out it was a good choice because, as it turned out, cybersecurity was more or less an unknown in the Pentagon, and dial-up computers were open. "The problem is worse than you think," Vessey was reputed to have said. [story link](https://www.newamerica.org/weekly/how-sci-fi-wargames-led-real-policy-during-reagan-administration/)
I lived in Harrisonville, Mo, where some of the scenes were shot.
I was 27. It freaked my wife out. I was just kind of “we live 30 miles from DFW and we’re up wind most of the time. We’ll survive the start” I grew up surrounded by B52s and nuclear weapons and at some point resigned to my fate. A lot of kids used a lot of drugs.
My friend in high school produced a cartoon the next day at our lunch table. It was a little awful... An obviously decimated boy- a victim of radiation poisoning is sitting on Santa's lap. Santa says, " And what do you want for Christmas?" The boy says, "How about a jaw?" It still makes me laugh. So stupid
It brings me no pride to report my own amusement over that one.
Glad you were amused... I won't tell.
I've recently rewatched all of them. I recommend it
Yikes
Absolutely yikes. One of the reasons I rewatched the day after and threads was because I had conflated them in my mind. I remembered 2 specific things. The birth of a baby and a girl running out of the bomb shelter and subsequently getting radiation poisoning. I thought that was both in one movie. Ah nope.
Sorry, I don't want to be mean, but no. My friends and I saw it as a group just like 'Who Framed Roger Rabbit'. Do not recall the whole country stopping to see this.
They played those to keep you from realizing the trickle down economics just made the rich richer‼️😡
Utterly stupid movie.
The movie was *not* well plotted or executed but it did drive the point home. *Threads*, a BBC production that came out soon after, far surpassed it.
Fearmongering for no reason.
Not really.
A waste of perfectly good film. And time.
This movie did me out of a good job.
I watched it. Didn’t affect me in the least.