UKC

Just watched "when the wind blows". :-|

Apparently they used to show it in schools, crazy!

In reply to Richard Carter: Confirmed - I saw it in the 80's at school, so what?

LD

In reply to Lurking Dave:

"Threads" was standard fare as well and particularly harrowing for those of us in S.Yorks.

In reply to Tom Valentine:

You watched Threads at school? Wow! WTWB is great but kind of like err, The Snowman by comparison.

Threads is pure misery.

In reply to Richard Carter:

I remember sneaking into the library to watch a black and white film played by the local CND group. I must have been about 12. I can't remember the name of the film but it was pretty grim and gave me nightmares for a while.
I think to illustrate what a firestorm could do they used original footage from Dresden - not good for a 12 year old.

E

In reply to Richard Carter:

Yep. Saw both Threads and Wtwb at school. Grim.
Only just got over it in time for the AIDS, crack and ethiopian education films.

And they wonder why our generation is so dispondant...

In reply to Enty:

I remember watching both THreads and 'The Day After', the US made nuclear war drama. Both scared the sh*t out of me, but Threads more so. I preferred the docu-drama style of Threads with its 'factual' inserts at various points outlining the general collapse of society which somehow made it more believable. And lets not get started on those ""Protect and Survive" public information broadcasts, now they gave me sleepless nights as a kid.

"Commentator: A warning may come quite unexpectedly. We will now tell you what to do if a warning sounds when you are at home, and then we will explain what to do when you are out of doors.

First, if you are at home: if an attack is imminent you will hear the attack sound like this [sirens]. So take cover at once. Send your young children to the fall-out room and then go quickly and turn off the gas and the electricity at the mains. Close down stoves, damp down fires, shut windows and draw curtains. Then go to your fall-out room and stay there. If the fall-out warning sounds are heard they will be like these: [thumps, ringing, whistling]

You should now move yourself and your family to the safest area in your fall-out room, that is, you should get inside your inner refuge and stay there. After 2 days the danger from fall-out will get less, but don’t take any risks by contact with it. The longer you stay in your refuge the better it will be for you.

Listen to your radio, stay where you are and keep listening to your radio.

Now this is what you should do if you are out of doors when the warning sounds.

Take cover at once when you hear the attack sound [sirens]. If you cannot reach home in 10 minutes, take cover in the nearest building. If there is no building nearby try to find some solid cover. If there is no solid cover, lie flat in a ditch or a hole and cover your head, face and hands as fast as you can with some of your clothes. If you hear the fall-out warning [thumping], seek the nearest and best cover as quickly as you can, but before entering the building or cover, brush or shake-off any fall-out dust you may have picked up and get rid of it. Change your outer clothing if you can and stay under cover. When the all-clear sounds like this [sirens], it means that you are safe from attack or fall-out for the time being and you can go out again. But keep listening for further warnings or your radio for further advice."

In reply to ice.solo:

Oh and First Blood, was shown that at school too.

In reply to Cú Chullain:

I watched both of them for the first time within the last 6 years.
As unpatriotic as it might sound, I think that The Day After has aged better as a film. They are obviously both "dated", but I think Threads has dated MORE, if that makes sense. Probably because the sudden loss of communication depicted in the film seems less likely these days. I think Threads is weakened a bit at the end too, where it tries to go proper post-apocalyptic with feral children and what not - comes across as a bit "silly", relative to the rest of it. I do imagine though that in the mid-1980s, Threads would certainly seem the more authentic (though we are comparing apples with oranges here anyway, given that The Day After had real well known movie stars in it)
Oddly, it's The Day After, and not Threads, which contains some real documentary footage!

It's interesting that they both choose a non-capital-city location for their story, and both for similar reasons (less well defended targets, central locations, huge impact)

In reply to Richard Carter:

It was on the radio first. I remember listening to a recording of it at school.

In reply to Enty:

Was it "The War Game"?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_War_Game
youtube.com/watch?v=nrGg8PfkbZw&

In reply to Richard Carter:

Watched "Threads" the other night after some kind soul linked to it on youtube from here. I was at home by myself. Boy did I have a good time! I Agree that the last half hour is a bit weak, everything else totally gripping, particularly those poor sods in their makeshift shelter of door off the hinges and a couple of mattresses. It made me remember when I was young wondering how easy it would be to convert our cellar in to a fall out shelter *shudders*.

In reply to Richard Carter: ermm what was crazy was the geopolitical situation at the time and the posturing between the Sepos and the Soviets. The threat of annihilation seemed very real in the early 80s...

In reply to Blue Straggler:

I actually thought the feral children bit would be fairly realistic if we are looking at the consequences of total nuclear war. I think that part of the film was supposed to be about 15 years or so after the attack where what few people were left had been reduced to a preindustrial revolution standards of living. Huge bodies of knowledge and institutions had been lost, schools non existent and all available labour (including kids) was on the land trying to eek out food in the midst of a nuclear winter.

The Day After was a more slick production but there was something about Threads that was way more gritty and chilling.

In reply to Richard Carter:

This threads become awesome - what was freakier; Threads or The Day After.

To me, Threads. We were told Threads was made by scientists, whereas The Day After was made by hollywood.

In reply to ice.solo:

The final shot of When the Wind Blows is pretty chilling though! Even more impactful in book form.

In reply to hokkyokusei:

That's it!! Deemed to grim for TV in the sixties - which was probably what drove us to sneak in to watch it!

E

In reply to Richard Carter: I'm amazed this thread hasn't started to bring up the horrifying sexual health file we were shown in the 80's....

In reply to Blue Straggler:

yep, tho it always had the edge softened for me as i kept expecting fungus the bogeyman to show up.
which could be the cruellest aspect of it all.