Finding it hard to sleep? Nailing those tranqs to get some zeds? Whatever you do, don’t watch tonight’s re-broadcast of Threads, the BBC’s dramadoc from 1984 about what happens when the big one drops; if you do, you won’t sleep properly for months. Either that or you’ll overdo the meds in your desperation and slip off the coil ahead of any anticipated mushroom clouds.
If, like me, you’re just curious to see what horrified folk when it first went out, it’s on BBC Four at 22:20.
Someone’s dropped a big one? For goodness sake open a window.*
* ©️ Moose 2009-2023.
Effectively a UK version of The Day After in the US but a lot more graphic.
Don’t imagine it’s held up very well so won’t be watching.
I saw it when it first aired and wouldn’t watch it again. Possibly the most bleak and depressing thing ever put on the telly
I saw it when it was first aired and everyone talked about it the next day.
Some very dark humour in it – the city’s council leaders are in an underground bunker seemingly controlling the civic response, but they are unable to do anything apart from slowly die from the radiation poisoning. Several days after the blast, one of them is very much on death’s door and he lights a fag. His similarly done-for colleague is slumped over a desk next to him. He raises his head and says “those are very bad for your health, you know…”.
It’s bad enough watching the news at the moment without watching this too.
I saw it when it was released – sobering and more worrying that we no longer seem to have any elder statesman leaders with brains to back down from confrontation.
I don’t see us here in the UK, the Americans, the Russians or the Chinese going nuclear in a war. Not even the North Koreans.
Even Putin, Kim Jong Un and Trump aren’t that crazy.
Netanyahu might do, in retaliation.
The Iranian Revolutionary Guards, however..
Or Isis…
I’ve only seen it once, when it was first shown, and I’ve never forgotten two scenes in particular: somebody wetting themselves in terror, and a milk bottle melting in the blast. Between them those two shots, probably lasting a few seconds, seem to sum up the horror on display. And by all accounts the creators knew the reality of the bomb would be much, much worse but showing it would be going too far for TV.
The Day After is not quite as bleak, but it’s still one of the darkest things I’ve seen on US TV. I recall reading that the President of the day (Reagan?) demanded an early showing and remained in silence for some time once it had finished. I’m not surprised.
If you’re in a nuclear sort of mood, a tense little film worth tracking down is By Dawn’s Early Light: the US leadership are on Air Force One, deciding how to deal with a (IIRC) Russian attack. Spoiler alert: things get badly out of control.
See also Twilight’s Last Gleaming: Burt Lancaster’s gang of desperadoes take control of a nuclear missile silo and threaten to launch unless their demands are met. Hello, ever-dependable Charles Durning as the President.
I once had a tour of a former nuclear bunker, where the chosen few would be ferried before the bomb dropped. By all accounts many of them said they would not take up their allotted space – they’d rather face the end with their families than survive in the bunker. The most eerie and chilling place I’ve ever been.
That was Anne Sellors, famously the shortest entry on IMDB as ‘Woman Who Urinates On Herself’
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm1856457/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0_tt_1_nm_7_in_0_q_anne%2520sellors
“By all accounts many of them said they would not take up their allotted space – they’d rather face the end with their families than survive in the bunker”
This is a conversation that Sharon and I have had given our post is first strike zone.
You’d be amazed how technical the “if nuclear then [this], if ICBM with payload of y then [that]”
Net conclusion was that if she was at work, I’m just going to pour a large whisky on play Highway To Hell
God, this is bleaker than I remembered.
We were made to watch Threads in school. I was in Grade 8/Second Form at the time and it had a profoundly depressing effect on me that lasted for a couple of years. It was the first time I had confronted my own mortality. I can actually remember the exact place I was on my walk home that day when the realisation hit me, and my world changed. I was numb. I get chills now thinking about it.
After 40 years to get over it, I can’t bear to watch it again
I’ll be visiting family in Sheffield in a couple of weeks time. Hopefully they’ll have cleared up by then and the radiation levels are back to normal.
@chrisf
Apparently things still so bad in Sheffield that the makers of The Walking Dead have booked the city and its army of shuffling zombies for their next 20 Daryl spin-off series
Having been born and grew up there, I can believe it…..
Actually, I still like Sheffield a lot and it would be a consideration as a place to live if / when we ever come back from Singapore.
I bought my LP of Seven Singles Deep by The Icicle Works in Sheffield, on a trip to watch the snooker at the Crucible.
Why do I remember this shit?
Only been there once – to see Michael Nesmith doing The Prison at Sheffield Uni in 1975 or 76. Actually quite lovely – very hilly with lots of trees
And I saw The Monkees there 2011 (sans Nesmith), one of my 2 visits. The other was to a university friend’s 21st birthday party which was held at Bramall Lane.
Lisa Genova in “Remember: The Science of Memory and the Art of Forgetting” says that this is because memories are like wax discs that record everything we perceive in the moment, be it sensory or cerebral, and these sit like layers in our head and body – a trigger from a scent or a sound can bring back all of the associated experience of that moment, particularly if it was a moment of drama or impact when the needle dug deep into the groove.
Though each time you ‘get out the wax disc’ to recall the memory, you leave the imprint of your grubby present day mitts on it.
Because it’s important.
Great Lp/ep btw
Grrrr..,in edit to @fentonsteve
I can remember who I was with at the time, too. All of those LPs (except the ones I bought online) trigger memories. Is it any wonder I struggle to get rid of the ones I never play?
I’ve visited Sheffield a few times over the years.
I like it.
We watched it and it was indeed a tough watch. Interesting to see how old fashioned the houses etc looked. Apart from a few things, it could have been the 50s. We are as far away from 1984 now as they were from the end of World War 2.
On a lighter note, the only music played seemed to be Chuck Berry. Nothing from the actual 80s, not least Sheffield’s own Human League.
As I see above nobody else has posted it, I will share a link to an article by The Word’s own Jude Rogers, writing in The Quietus about her experience as a ‘Thread-head’ and the Radio 4 documentary she produced on the subject.
https://thequietus.com/opinion-and-essays/black-sky-thinking/threads-tv-film-review-anniversary/
As you would expect, she writes intelligently, interestingly and with feeling on the subject.
Many thanks – what an engrossing and erudite piece.
It’s dated for sure but utterly terrifying.
I also think I’m in the film, in the crowd shopping scenes, with my mum as an 8 year old.. Which makes it even scarier when they blow it up
Anyone else ever accidentally been in a film about nuclear holocaust?