THREADS   1984
Directed by Mick Jackson
112 minutes
In English

We are, according to scientists, on the brink of nuclear war... the 'Doomsday clock' has now been moved 90 seconds to midnight, the closest it's ever been in history. So it seems like a good time to dig up this cinematic gold nugget that deals with this issue head on. Threads still remains one of the most relevant and unforgettable movies of any genre from the 1980s. It is the kind of film that is almost impossible to be unaffected by, and it was responsible for radically changing the lives of an entire generation.

Two hard-hitting movies were made in Britain about the possibility of a nuclear war. One was by Peter Watkins called The War Game, which was banned by the BBC in 1965. The other film, made almost twenty years later, was called Threads, and it was aired in September 1984. Millions of viewers were absolutely shocked to the core. It is a dead simple dramatization of what would happen if a nuclear bomb was dropped on England. There is no need for me to go into details about this searing flick, it is something that just has to be seen to be believed. In America they made a few films based on this same idea, but they were mostly phony and over-sentimental. This is the real thing. It is based on a screenplay by Barry Hines (Ken Loach’s Kes) and nominated for seven BAFTA Awards.

One of the things I've noticed in the last couple years is that when I screen an anti-war film the audience drops by more than 50%. As many of you know, America and Britain have sent long-range missiles to the war zone. Not only that, but they are missiles that can  only be operated by the Americans and the British, meaning they are actively engaged for the first time. This escalation takes us closer to a nuclear war than ever before, and the lack of discussion about it in the general public makes it even more possible simply because there is no push-back, no resistance against it. If such an incident occurs, it means your life will be over within just a couple minutes of warning. Therefore, I think it's necessary to drag the nuclear war masterpiece THREADS out of the closet. 

What an intense, life-altering flick. Like the song goes "It's a hard rain's a-gonna fall."