Threads (1984) [DVD]

Gripping drama. It is arguably the best film, in my opinion, to cover the nuclear paranoia of the 1980s. There is detailed coverage of a nuclear blast. The mushroom cloud is seen together with the blinding white flash, that sends chills down your spine. A clever film, it covers the effects of the destruction on people, the environment and civilization itself. The effects can be felt for many years after. Above all, though, it shows the methods used by the government to control the population. Some can be brutal, such as being shot for looting food. The plot follows the story of Ruth, a pregnant woman, who survives the nuclear holocaust, against all odds, to die cataract ridden about 10 years later.

I'm not much of a critic but I'd say that I'm happy that I purchased this DVD after hearing about it not too long ago and I wish that I was aware of it earlier.It's a very dark, grim and atmospheric movie that sucks you in and is very compelling and upsetting in it's portrayal of what is a hypothetical/theoretical situation of what could happen on this small island that is the UK. I'm no expert in nuclear warfare by a long shot but it is very detailed and to the point and it shows what very well could happen during and long after a nuclear attack on the UK with no Hollywood gloss and has some great, vivid and powerful imagery that really brings it home and it is done in a docu-drama style that I personally thought made it better when explaining the likely events during the movie.The only thing is that it might be a little dated in some aspects but I think that can be easily excused in the overall message and meaning behind it as it was first broadcast over 30 years ago now. Also, I can't really speak on how accurate it may have been back when it was first made or how it may be in this day and age but it is how I'd imagine, not that I'd want to imagine, a nuclear war but it's still a very gritty and harrowing movie non-the-less.I highly recommend this DVD as it's extremely well made and put together and nothing I've watched has effected me so deeply in a long time.

This film is deeply disturbing. It will stay with you and for good reason.I watched Threads in 1984 or 1985 as a child. It was trailed big time before launch with the image of the melting milk bottles. Halfway through watching it me and my sister were sent to bed. I remember the last scene we were allowed to watch was the gutting of the sheep on the moors.I am glad we didn't see the entire film when I was that young. I am also glad that it made enough of an impact to make me watch it 30 years later.This film is still very relevant. When the minor official in the council basement impotently says 'the bloody antennae were on the roof': the same fragile network (or set of threads) still applies.If anything we are more vulnerable to social collapse than the Sheffield of 1984.There will be no Facebook amidst the Fallout.Chilling, gritty and effective. This should be shown on 12th of November every year by the BBC. The day after the perennial glorification of war that we have come to know as Armistice Day. Barry Hines' classic is an antidote to the recent whimsical celebrations of 'The Great War' (The Sainsbury's advert was about as distasteful as it gets).It graphically describes a war that bombs people back to the stone age. No poppies just a bucket of rats.

There has long been argument about the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. At first it was thought that only a vastly greater explosive effect had been created. Only later did the affects of the radiation become obvious. Following the bombing of these two cities it became obvious that after any such an attack, if there was any victor, the prize would only be heaps of poisonously radioactive rubble. This unexpected lesson has probably deterred anybody from launching such an attack ever since WW2.This particular DVD is as accurate a reconstruction as possible of an event that fortunately never happened. It brings home all the horrors of the possible use of nuclear weapons and the likely aftermath. The descriptions of the horror has been adequately covered by other reviewers but I remain so shaken by what I saw that I don't think that I will have the moral courage to watch this DVD again, such was the level of realism.

It had taken me a long time to bring myself to acquire and watch this DVD because I knew what was coming.This film tells you the reality of nuclear warfare and how there can be no winners only losers. The whole aftermath is a hopeless journey with an inevitable outcome.Most people are understandably blissfully ignorant of the constant nuclear threat and also of its unimaginable magnitude and effects should, God forbid, it ever happen.The fact is radiation is always a killer in such doses and one bomb detonated anywhere on this planet will affect everyone on the planet forever.The fact that politicians and world leaders have allowed an arms race to develop in the past giving them the capacity to destroy the earth and almost everything on it several times over shows us how much power they have. They talk peace but arm the nations in order to exercise power to keep the peace. Something is not quite right with that thinking.I conclude that this film is a lesson in the folly of possessing and deploying the nuclear deterrant. I have always believed in knowledge and awareness of the realities in life but others may disagree.Watch it but don't allow it to consume your hopes and aspirations of a better future.

Très bon film et service impeccable

this is one film that stays with you long after you've watched it. the international events that lead up to the megaton exchange between the soviets and americans feels like a slow and ponderous nightmare, with tactical nuclear exchanges foreshadowing the final strategic one; and as a bystander of these events, the viewer wonders, like the citizens of sheffield, england, why the soviet and american leaders aren't coming to their senses.with the strategic exchange, a different kind of nightmare takes shape: the cataclysmic death and destruction is followed by more death and destruction, which unfolds in stages with the aftermath of the exchange: first the nuclear fallout, then the nuclear winter, then the harsh UV exposure due to the thinning of ozone in the upper atmosphere. and though the timescales of the film elongate to take us through ~13 years after the holocaust, we watch civilization collapsing so fast in the aftermath, we know that though the films ends with that collapse still in freefall, there could be no other way to end it without lying to the viewer.the line that never should have been crossed --- the use of nuclear weapons in war ---, was crossed; and everybody pays dearly as a result.

Meine Gedanken nach Mick Jacksons BBC-Film „Threads“ lassen sich schwer beschreiben. Ich habe selten in einem so tiefen Abgrund geblickt und hatte es so schwer den Weg hinaus zu finden. Klingt erst einmal leicht pathetisch, aber es passt genau. „Threads“ zeigt die ersten 15 Jahre nach einem atomaren Krieg. Der Film hat Bilder in mein Hirn gebrannt, die ich nie wieder vergessen werden. „Threads“ greift eiskalt zu und lässt nie wieder los.Als die kleine Stadt Sheffield ins Jahr 1984 startet, ahnt noch keiner den Einschlag einer Atombombe. Nachrichtensendungen werden großflächig ignoriert, während der kalte Krieg droht warm zu werden. Über die ersten 30 Minuten lernen wir die verschiedenen Hauptcharaktere kennen und rätseln uns aus den diversen Schnipseln von Radiosendungen und Einblendungen ein Kriegsszenario zusammen. Dann eskaliert die Situation. Der Zuschauer wird zusammen mit den Hauptcharakteren in einen tiefschwarzen Schlund gerissen, der dem Horror-Genre alle Ehre machen würde, wäre das Szenario nur nicht so real.Mit detailreich ausgestatteten Sets und kunstvoll gemalten Hintergründen, beschwört Jackson eine unvergleichliche Atmosphäre herauf. Man kann die Auswirkungen des Fallouts quasi riechen. Nachdem ein Blitz ganz Sheffield erhellt hat, folgt nur noch Schwärze. Ein zutiefst verstörendes Szenario aus Tod und verderben, getränkt in Blut und Staub.Durch den pseudo-dokumentarischen Stil wird der Zuschauer immer wieder an die umliegenden Faktoren erinnert und lernt so nach und nach die ganze Situation kennen. Man kann die Post-Apokalypse kaum eindringlicher beschreiben. Man will das Martyrium der Protagonisten nicht miterleben, wird aber immer wieder an den Bildschirm gefesselt. Die grauenerregenden Folgen des Atomschlages setzen sich fest und rauben den Schlaf. Kaum ein Gruselfilm schafft es wirklich Furcht in mir auszulösen, „Threads“ hat mich bis ins Mark erschüttert.Wenn die Körper langsam von Krebs und anderen Krankheiten zerfressen werden, die Nahrung zuneige geht, die Sonne sich verdunkelt und die Gewalt immer weiter eskaliert, dann hat man den Atomkrieg realer erlebt als man es jemals wollte. „Threads“ blickt dem Tod ins Auge und konfrontiert den Zuschauer auf die unerbittlichste Art und Weise mit dem puren Chaos. Ein Film der dem Namen „Anti-Kriegsfilm“ mehr als gerecht wird und hierzulande viel mehr Aufmerksamkeit verdient hätte. Ein Gesellschafts-Portrait in unserer dunkelsten Stunde, ein Monster von einem Film.

Ist a guter Film was ein atomarer Holocaust mit sich bringt dramatisch real zwar aus den 80er aber sehr gut wahrscheinlich wäre es noch schlimmer als im Film zwar auf englisch aber für mich realer als The Day After.Hoffe das nie soweit.Schön auch die 5-10 Jahre danach wo die Menschheit immer no im Mittelalter ist.

A must for any serious collector of cold-war film. The definitive document of the early 1980s, clearly too real for American audiences who were scared enough by the less-worthy The Day After. The print is clear as one can expect for the period. No-frills packaging, but I consider myself fortunate to finally own this moving film. Now I'm looking for the third film of this genre, "Letters From A Dead Man," the Russian version. Both Threads and Letters are more realistic and this more deeply touching than the American films of the era.