Sometimes you have to go through something painful just to recognize how good it is. There's a lot to be gained by putting up with the most disheartening shit possible: Do you want to hear depressing news? Do you want to feel anxious and restless? Do you want to leave feeling hopeless and cynical about the world?
That's the experience of watching Threadsthe 1984 TV movie now airing as part of the new Criterion channel Post-apocalyptic science fiction series. (Sorry, did you think I was talking about something different called Threads?) Directed by Mick Jackson and written by novelist Barry Hines, Threads It was a cultural phenomenon in the UK when it aired on the BBC. Depicting the consequences of nuclear fallout with unwavering clarity, the film continues the legacy of The war game, the pseudodocumentary that was so compelling in 1966 that it had to be pulled from broadcast for being “too gruesome” (but was later brought to theaters). Yeah Threads It was a retread of The war gameAfter the controversial reception, it definitely worked.
Almost four decades later, still it works, and Threads It is no less difficult to see. Produced during the Cold War, the film imagines tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union boiling over, with the industrial city of Sheffield caught in the spillover. Bombs go off, the city is leveled, and at that point, things haven't even gotten that bad yet.
Every time you think things can't get any bleaker, the movie finds a way.
Threads is thematically a better combination of movies with oppenheimer that Barbie (on the other hand, Barbie + poor things It would be a fun combination.) If Christopher Nolan only gives an elegant glimpse into the horrors of nuclear fallout (a brief sequence in which Japanese citizens are eerily reduced to dust while Cillian Murphy stares guiltily into the camera), then Threads spends its entire second half demonstrating how reductionist that representation is. It turns out that the bomb is the easiest thing to observe.
Especially in its rear half, Threads He is ruthless and, in some ways, a little naive. Sand, dirt, debris, rats, people eating rats – it's remarkable that this was broadcast on television. Every time you think things can't get any bleaker, the movie finds a way. The British government, short on resources, quickly becomes fascist; The effects of radiation poisoning manifest with many bodily characteristics; and the threadbare characters (sorry) just get by, and the movie never gives them a reason why they should move on.
But Threads' commitment is what makes it so successful. Again, this came in the mid-80s and is still more disturbing than any movie or TV show I've seen in years. There is a richness in the details such as Threads disaster scenario games. The nuclear winter has blocked out the sun, wiping out all crops; when sunlight returns years later, its ultraviolet form is so intense that it causes widespread cataracts in survivors. There's really no good twist here, just fascinating horror after fascinating horror. It's hard to watch, but I promise it's well made and quite satisfying. (Later, you can watch Criterion's counterprogramming, a programming of cat movies.)
On Letterboxd, my partner only rates movies but never leaves reviews. After observing Threads, wrote the first. He simply said, “Christ.” Then he gave it four stars.
