Threads

[MrFrost]

Anyone seen this film?
Think i'm scarred for life.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Anyone seen this film?
Think i'm scarred for life.

First time you've seen it Frosty?

I saw it as a 17 year old in 1984. It scared the living shite out of me. Truly, truly terrifying.

There was this genuine air of imminent doom around then. And it was very nearly justified. Google "Able Archer" and see how close we came to catastrophe in the early 80s.

[MrFrost]

Anyone seen this film?
Think i'm scarred for life.

First time you've seen it Frosty?

I saw it as a 17 year old in 1984. It scared the living shite out of me. Truly, truly terrifying.

There was this genuine air of imminent doom around then. And it was very nearly justified. Google "Able Archer" and see how close we came to catastrophe in the early 80s.

Yeah, watched it last night. It came "recommended" to me.
Fair to say, there are a few images from it I won't be forgetting in a while.

Such a situation doesn't bare thinking about. Sorry to say, I reckon it is still a real possibility in my lifetime.

[jucyberry]

Shock tv was the flavour of the day back then, I remember being frit to death by it too..

Does anyone remember the programmes showing the effect of a neuclear bomb on a water melon that was supposed to be the same as on a human head?...................In slooooooooowwwww motion..

Or the overly panicstricken propaganda progs about AIDS...

[Glyn_Wigley]

See it? I was IN it!

[MrFrost]

See it? I was IN it!

How's the radiation poisoning?

[BillyStubbsTears]

Glyn

Got it. You were that woman on Fargate who pissed herself when the bomb landed on Finningley!

[Glyn_Wigley]

Not quite. I was a student at Sheffield Poly (as it was then) when they filmed it. A message came down through the Students Union that they wanted (unpaid!) extras for some of the crowd and street scenes. It sounded a bit of a giggle so me and a few friends went along. We were in the crowd of protesters that you saw for a few fleeting seconds as part of the fictitious international tension build-up news story to the bomb being dropped. Never spotted myself, but I'm definitely in there somewhere..!

[jonnydog]

Hmmm, is it well worth a watch?

I might have to give this a perusal... Only £4.99 on BBC website

[BillyStubbsTears]

Is it worth a watch?

Aye, if you want to get a taste of why that era is the most terrifying one in human existence.

Interesting side issue. Ronnie Reagan said that watching The Day After in 1983 changed his attitude to nuclear war. Well The Day After was like a Disney cartoon compared to Threads. If he'd seen Threads, he would have joined CND.

It's ropey. It's not polished. But that makes it even more powerful. It looks like a home video of the Apocalypse.

[afro goal machine]

Jonnydog it's on YouTube, but it's in 12 parts. Saves a fiver though.
Going to give it a watch myself was gripped by the wikipedia read

[MrFrost]

Hmmm, is it well worth a watch?

I might have to give this a perusal... Only £4.99 on BBC website

Oh yeah. Not sure i'd watch it for a second time. Probably the most disturbing piece of film making I have ever seen. However it is intensely gripping.

Main difference to all these Hollywood disaster movies is that Threads has no happy ending. There is no hope what so ever for anyone in the film.

[jucyberry]

Any one else feel ancient listening to the young un's discovering Threads for the first time...Or is it just me? 

[MrFrost]

Any one else feel ancient listening to the young un's discovering Threads for the first time...Or is it just me? 

I wouldn't say i'm a young un! I was born before it was released!

[jucyberry]

Ah but Michael you would have been not much more than a babe in arms... I was 20...lol

I'm just downloading it at the moment....this is the comment on it...

I have never been so moved, shocked, upset, disturbed... and may I add 1,000 other adjectives ?? WHEW! I first saw this on a video tape from our Public Library in late 1986.. I was SO upset that I couldn't bring myself to watch it again until the threat of nuclear war had, for the most part, evaporated, in 1996 !! Done in documentary style, this horror of a nuclear strike by the former (whew) Soviet Union on England so terrified me that I almost became physically ill. Forget your slasher horror flicks and Freddie Kruegers, this one is REAL horror. I doubt if you will be able to rent it.. try your local library, and repeat after me: It's only a movie...It's only a movie... It's.... How close did it come to being reality?? We will never know! The scene when the "Big One" explodes right outside the house of a family that we had been following.. and needed to follow no more.. was one of the most moving scenes, horrifing too, that I have EVER seen in the movies or on TV. All our politicians , nay ALL politicians (and World Leaders), should be required to watch the destruction from a nuclear blast on ordinary citizens.. Watch them melt, vaporize, burn, blister, vomit... get the picture?
 

[BillyStubbsTears]

Full film on YouTube for anyone prepared to frighten themselves witless.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_MCbTvoNrAg

It was originally shown in 2 parts on BBC. I'll be honest, I couldn't bring myself to watch the second part. It sat there on the VHS for years and I used to shudder fast-forwarding past it. Utterly horrifying.

[BillyStubbsTears]

On a lighter note, I'd clean forgotten that our next manager was the lead role in Threads.

[bigbadjack]

I used to lay in bed on a school night worrying about nuclear war after watching threads, t

[BillyStubbsTears]

The thing that did it for me was an article in either the Donny Star or possible the old Donny Evening Telegraph about the effect of a 1Megtonne bomb dropped on the old Gaumont.

First conclusion was that the matinee would have been cancelled.

The rest was chilling - vivid descriptions of the blast, fire and radiation damage at different radii. Absolutely scared the bejaysus out of me as a 15 or 16 year old. Especially because Finningley was in line for a 1MT present in the opening salvo. If things had got hot, Donny would have been right on the very front line.

I fully understood the whole idea of Mutually Assured Destruction and I was far from a bleeding heart liberal. But that experience, combined with America's deliberate policy of trying to destabilise MAD by getting a technological advantage that would put Russia under increased threat was what put me into CND.

The Cruise and particularly the Pershing missile deployment was a phenomenally risky gamble. It basically put several hundred missiles within a few hundred miles of the Soviet Union, and meant that they would have had very little reaction time in the event of an American strike. It was a deliberate policy to force the Soviets into a technology race that they couldn't keep up with.

Of course, history shows that the gamble worked. The Soviets were broken by this and the end of the Soviet Union came along very soon. But it might well have turned very nasty. In the run-up to the deployment, the Kremlin was in a frenzy,  convincing itself that America DID plan to unleash a first strike. In that atmosphere, Able Archer, KAL007 or any other catalyst could have tipped us over the edge sometime around 83-84.

Truly terrifying times at the time, and even more so now that more information has emerged.

[Crowle Rover]

Absolutely scared the shit out of me!!
As mentioned above,the threat of nuclear annihilation in the early 80's was very real.
A grim,grey world back then.
In fact, top prog band The Enid released an album called "Something Wicked This Way Comes" dealing with nuclear attack and its aftermath.Check it here;


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CM4cV1xYHEk

See also P.I.Ls "Metal Box".
Sums up collapsing Britain in the late 70s/early 80s perfectly

[BillyStubbsTears]

Aye. Grim times back then.

Recession. Industrial collapse. Strikes and job losses. Thatcher, Reagan, Brezhnev. SS20s and Pershing Missiles. And Prog Rock.

[Glyn_Wigley]

In fact, top prog band The Enid released an album called "Something Wicked This Way Comes" dealing with nuclear attack and its aftermath.Check it here;


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CM4cV1xYHEk

See also P.I.Ls "Metal Box".
Sums up collapsing Britain in the late 70s/early 80s perfectly

I've still got my vinyl copy of this:

http://www.thoseoldrecords.co.uk/WARGASM-ANTI-NUKE-LP-DEAD-KENNEDYS-EX-POSTER-RARE

This the best song on it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-TcNcS-CG8

but if you like a laugh and a bit of anti-Thatcher stuff, have a listen to this...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tdfDI7bTwog

[belton rover]

Aye. Grim times back then.

Recession. Industrial collapse. Strikes and job losses. Thatcher, Reagan, Brezhnev. SS20s and Pershing Missiles. And Prog Rock.

Not forgetting Carl Swan and Shaun Flanagan

[jucyberry]

Did you spot Steve Halliwell, the actor who plays Zac Dingle?

[RobTheRover]

Wasnt "Threads" a documentary of day to day life in Sheffield?  Maybe I missed the point.....

;-)

[AbsolutDRFC]

Aye. Grim times back then.

Recession. Industrial collapse. Strikes and job losses. Thatcher, Reagan, Brezhnev. SS20s and Pershing Missiles. And Prog Rock.

Plus Rotherham United and Barnsley had just started to be (relatively) successful too.....

[not on facebook]

Sat and Watched it last nite and crapped me sen.

Same as i did back in 1984.

Makes it Worse When finningley and doncaster are brought into the documentry.

[jonnydog]

Just got round to watching this tonight.

Very good and terrifying. Does make you think, to the point I'm going to be up all night now making an Anderson Shelter!!

To say when it was made, the effects are excellent and the suspense in parts was very well done. Although I was only a (very) young 'un when it was first broadcast I can't imagine the response it got with what was going off at that time.

[DonnyNoel]

Just got round to watching this tonight.

Very good and terrifying. Does make you think, to the point I'm going to be up all night now making an Anderson Shelter!!

To say when it was made, the effects are excellent and the suspense in parts was very well done. Although I was only a (very) young 'un when it was first broadcast I can't imagine the response it got with what was going off at that time.

I was the opposite after watching it, don't think I'd want to survive a nuclear blast and go through all that...