Look at all the hysterical people- in a real-world scenario, if they acted like this, there'd be no rebuilding at all. EVERY PERSON in this stupid movie is a drama queen.
@whiskerchild IT WAS A FUCKING NUCLEAR WAR. You know, EVERYBODY FUCKING DYING. Either mercifully in the blasts or painfully and slowly of radiation sickness/burns/contaminated water/no food/ect. You tell me;; wouldn't you freak out if you knew you were about to die?
No, it wouldn't freak me out. Wouldn't freak a lot of other people out either: gotta keep your head on your shoulders to help others to the bitter end and help yourself go out with grace.
Not sayin' I'd like it, but..........just saying the above.
@whiskerchild: I'm sorry, whiskerchild, but Jakezing's right: we're not talking about an earthquake or a hurricane, we're talking about a FULL-SCALE nuclear war in which tens of millions could easily die, in the U.S. alone.
There is a continuity error. The airmen indicated that Beale had been taken out already then we see staff a Beale reporting to the Looking Glass aircraft. Unless I heard the conversation between the airmen incorrect?
@ClearSmashDrop Unintentional continuity error; since the footage in question was culled from another film (the 1979 PBS mockumentary "First Strike") it was fairly easy to get jumbled in production.
I know this is just a movie, but the 1st detonation which was aerial and meant to destroy the power grid and telecommunication via EMP would have taken out the starters in the cars as well.
OMG !!!! The special effects of people burning and turning into dust are soo bad BUT STILL, you can feel the horror. Man, I got chills, in a bad way. Dunno if today,s effect would make it more realistic but hot damn that shit is scary
I was 15 when the movie came out, and though I didn't get any nightmares from it, the ground zero victims getting skeletonized and vaporized was the most disturbing part of the film to me.
I remember watching this movie when it came out. Scared the hell outta me. I'm so glad the Cold War is over. Hopefully Hiroshima and Nagasaki are the last cities to ever be destroyed with nuclear weapons.
The bit where the black guy at 5.35 runs down into the ditch is a lot like Pasolini's 'Gospel According to St Matthew' where Judas runs into the gulch. Nice primal idea.
for those who keep saying Threads is better, the end of the film does say things could've been a lot worse, so in a sense they're admitting this isn't as best or as realistic as it could be in real life, Threads is in effect an example of that more realistic brutal period. It's like Testament, On the Beach, Miracle Mile, Terminator films, When the Wind Blows all deal with nuclear war, but different extremes of the situation. Good work on the uploading Lothartheterrible.
It's always puzzled me a bit...when the EMP from the high-altitude blast knocks out all the power, we see people in all manner of activities - on the phone, at the movies (?) - in darkness. And when the bombs hit KC we see people in random activities - weddings, playgrounds, schoolrooms, etc. being vaporized. But...the sirens were going off, weren't they? The EBS was screaming its head off, wasn't it? Wouldn't EVERYBODY be freaking the fuck out?
From reading I've down, stats say it would have taken just over one hour to have alerted the whole of the country.
Most of the sirens had generators they kick on if the grid goes down, an EMP doesn't knock out everything electrical. There is a gentlemen on Youtube who has a channel solely dedicated to Cold War era sirens, Survey Meters, Geiger Counters, ect...
Even if people had taken cover, chances of survival in a non hardened structure are slim.
What confuses me is that in the beginning of this part, you hear one of the guards at the base state that Beale AFB was knocked out... but a little bit later we hear the phone call where the radar tech says "Missile Warning this is Beale, confidence is high I repeat confidence is high." Is it a continuity error or are we to assume the guard was mistaken?
@jjobie Unintentional continuity error. There are many throughout the movie; this one probably a direct result of the fact that the scene in question was recycled from another film.
@jjobie As lothar mentioned there are many continuity errors. Many of them are due to the fact that ABC originally wanted the film to be a two-part miniseries (over Nicholas Meyer's objections). When the network couldn't find sponsors for any scenes after the attack, however, they reversed their decision and told Meyer to edit the film down so it could be shown in just one night. This doesn't really pertain to the error you mentioned, but it may explain several others.
@jjobie It was not a continuity error, imo. Nicholas Meyers, the film's director was being pressured by the U.S. government to have the Soviets launch first. He managed to do this by putting the sequence of events in reverse order. That is the most logical explanation. The political implications of this film gave great concern to both ABC and the U.S. government, so it seems likely that Meyers caved to the pressure and had the Soviets launch ICBM's first, but did so in a not so obvious way.
@lydiahoggarth Yeah, well, your opinion is wrong. To have Beale be destroyed, and then magically be undestroyed in the following scene does nothing to support a Soviet first strike. The scene in which the airman says "Missile warning, this is Beale..." is recycled footage from "First Strike"; it was shot in 1979 before this film was even conceived. In the course of forming your hypothesis, it would have helped for you to have noted that his name is Nicholas Meyer, not "Meyers".
@lothartheterrible Try out this explaination. The storytelling is not linear. The guard mentioning Beal AFB is talking after Beal has already been destroyed. Then a flash forward to scenes of Beal AFB putting out warning before it is destroyed... and we see the sirens going off etc.
In the movie (propaganda film) First Strike that the Beal scene is taken from that's basically what happens. Beal detects the first strike then...boom.
@lothartheterrible While we're talking about this sequence, I have another question which may or may not be valid. In the scene where Jason Robards gets caught on the highway during the attack, we see one warhead go off, forming a mushroom cloud; a little bit later there's a second detonation which appears to be pretty close to the first one. Wouldn't the shock front from the second explosion have partially (at least) dissipated the mushroom cloud from the first one?
@jjobie 1983, made for TV; this was as good as it gets. Nick Meyer is a director, not a nuclear physicist. When one considers that they made the mushroom clouds by injecting colored ink into a water tank, I think that the results are satisfactory.
emp has been around since the 1st nuclear weapon was even tested, so it wass devloped by the americans, but both countries hav the technolgy exept the us emp burst are more powerful
@ps3bandit8 any country or other entity with the capability to detonate an atomic/nuclear weapon would of course have the ability to use emp, since it's part of the effect of detonation..as for the US having a more powerful emp effect, how do you arrive at that conclusion ?
@ITILII higher yield nuiclear weapons, currently the russians highest yield weapon is between 550-800kt while ours was a 9mt b53 bomb(until last year after they were all dismanteld) but now its the 1.2mt b83 and i am almost assured that we hav dedicated EMP type weapons, decades furtehr in advancement than the russians or chinese
I'll do my best to translate into terms you can grasp: lulz like omg, u doodz don't understand that when nukez killz every1 it dont matter who has the bigger ones; we all die anyway!!11!1!!! lol omg wtf lol.
LOL LOL - @1:43 - it always makes me laugh... let' s get this straight, atomic bombs are gonna level your city, and you and 100,000 other people are going to be stuck in a traffic jam staying on the right side of the road instead of thinking, hey, the opposite lane is EMPTY!! LOL
@lothartheterrible The big bright flash was a nuke. Nukes that are airbursted (usually megaton warheads) cause a greater EMP affect than those that hit their target. Depending on the altitude of the airburst (and the power of the warhead) will determine the area of affect. Not sure what the altitude is for this one, but I've read that if one is airbursted in the upper atmosphere (probably the phase 2 stage of an ICBM launce) it's EMP can wipe out electronics in half or the whole country.
@765Genobreaker Is that what that was? Gee, thank you; I was having a bear of a time ascertaining what that bright flash was in this movie *depicting a nuclear missile exchange*. I understand the technicality of how nuclear weapons function just as much as a lay person should, thanks; but if there is anything else you would like to point out, Captain Obvious, you're more than welcome to do so.
@wilhelmschumann y'know..the russians were developing EMP bombs, that would only detonate an EMP. it was their battleplan: stop all communications, THEN let the nukes hit
The order they put the *First Strike* video makes it seem the United States went all out (or, at least, strategic) first. We got the inbound warning *after* we'd launched our ICBM's. I don't recall picking up on that when I watched it on broadcast air.
Ya know what is not so funny? I bet someone that due to an explosion of a smaller bomb, wouldn't know the difference from this depiction of a really large bomb.
Really doesn't make a difference in the scheme of things. You die from a car bomb, you die from a bomb on an airplane or you die from a really big fancy nuclear bomb...
I think it ends up the same....
And, honestly, I don't think it matters who made the bomb...
@kittkatt1975 Conventional explosives and IEDs wouldn't end up leaving the Earth ruined for decades after their use in a global war.
The Day After and Threads were all about getting people to realize that fact. Nuclear weapons aren't just "bigger and fancier explosives." After a global thermonuclear war, life on Earth would be left in serious jeopardy.
Why was this movie so panned when it came out? I don't mean by rightwingers who don't want to know all the consequences of war, but I mean artistically. What was so bad about it? Just because it's not "Threads" doesn't make it a bad movie. Both are great, terrifying movies.
@mphello It wasn't; it was nominated for several Emmy awards. It didn't start getting "panned" until people on here started turning it into a pissing contest over which country made the better movie: the US or the UK. My stance is this: both films served their purpose in that they scared the bejesus out of people, and made them *think*.
@lothartheterrible Thank you for that insight. I agree: BOTH movies made people think.
I love the hypocrisy of those who complain: "the films are a 'joke' because they don't show the horrors of nuclear war enough". So, what do these people want? An actual limited nuclear war demonstration?
Remember, a lot of them are from a generation jaded by CGI and bright, flashy objects that illicit lots of "oohs" and "ahhs", where it is about spectacle more than story. If one wants to split hairs, "Terminator 2" featured a much more frighteningly realistic depiction of a nuclear attack than either of these films, but even it was more about style than substance.
@lothartheterrible Yes, the short 20-second nuclear attack in T2 is very good and scary, but I wouldn't say it was better - either technically or artistically - than the ones in TDA or Threads.
I'm from the same "generation", but I've never let tv or CGI go to my head. I just RECYCLED a perfectly working giant 70-kilogram cathode-ray-tube tv in order to free up space in my house.
And, I don't care about movies: i.e. I could die happy if I never see another movie in my life.
@mphello Oh, I didn't say it was "better"; I said it was "(more) realistic". I succumbed to the allure of a plasma big screen, but mainly for sports and the occasional video game; I quit watching movies en masse right about the time Hollywood started running out of ideas (in other words, in about 1999 or so).
@mphello Actually nuclear scientists thanked James Cameron for the nuclear attack sequence in Terminator 2, saying it was the most accurate portrayal of what would happen in a nuclear attack.
i was born in 1981 i think i was 4 maybe 5 when i seen this, it was the scarcest movie that has haunted me for years after seeing it i thought it was really going to happen i could int sleep my mom was like dot worry it was only a movie and still i was still terrified i thought it was the end so many nights i couldn't sleep this was a horror move i think it was the most terrifying movie i have ever seen ,,,it really messed me up seeing this movie when i was young!!!!!!! :(
@noobcrusher141 That's because the producers took clips from the First Strike documentary and jumbled their sequence, so that it wouldn't be clear who launched first.
In the documentary, the clip of Beale AFB and the staff doing a confidence warning is one of the first scenes that happens, because that documentary is about the Soviet Union launching a surprise attack on the USA's nuclear forces.
You are correct. Those are films of atomic and nuclear tests during the Cold War. Those are not "cool effects.". You can see much of that and other footage in the documentaries "The Day After Trinity". Or "Day One".
All of the people that were outside and not killed by the immediate blast all suffered leathal doses of radiation. The black soldier, the old Doctor, the nurse was probably outside too.
I believe that sequence (along with a few of the other explosion parts) was from the videos that were shot during nuclear tests the government conducted.
Do any cities still have nuclear attack sirens? I'm actually more worried about silent weapons like chemical or biological attacks. You wouldn't know until after it was used.
After the sirens go off, if the missiles take 30 minutes to reach the US from Russia, how long will the sirens run for? Do they set the sirens off right when they detect a launched missile from the USSR?
this is beautifull and it will happen. We (Russia China) are tired of you yank bitches allways policeing evrybody, fuck this BS kingdom America, Revelation 18 shows America`s future
@mihail2000 You're using the wrong avatar for a troll; it should be something obnoxiously trendy or edgy. Here's another tip: if you're going for irony, lambasting a country for "policing everybody" loses bite when it's coming from someone defending the largest remaining communist police state where human rights are not too terribly high on the priority list. BTW, I'm a teacher; the only people I "police" are my students. So fuck you.
@mihail2000 so let me get this straight...you are coming down on the citizens of a police state? like the CITIZENS are the bad guys?? lol! do you normally go around insulting people where you are who have nothing to do with what their fucking sociopathic government does or is this strictly utube people based for you? you DO realize it's the bozos who sit in office that declare wars right? not the slaves who live their everyday lives....give your head a shake. EVOLVE stop DEvolving.
I remember this coming on when I was a just 5yrs old.. This movie traumatized me so much, that it is embedded so deep in my brain I never forgot the name and the actors that were in this movie..
They have a lot of the original nuclear testing clips from New Mexico in the movie. My grandparents use to tell us when we were little that they saw a very bright light coming from the South (in New Mexico) during all that nuclear testing. They knew that something wasn't right and wondered what was going on. Now, the testing sites were in southern New Mexico and my grandparents lived in northern New Mexico (Four Corners area). Scary information.
Interesting as a 10 year old watching this movie, I didn't understand the aerial detonation. I asked my grandmother why did the bomb go off so high above the ground. She had no answer. Of course when I found this uploaded on YouTube, I knew exactly what it was, strategic detonation for EMP.
One thing that always sticks with me about this sequence is the businessman running into the shelter clutching his briefcase (starts at about 4:22), as if he's going to need any of his office papers anymore. On the other hand, in his panic the briefcase was probably his best link to his normal, everyday life, so of course he would want to hang on to it.
Did the Military have any defnse for missiles at this time? Like anything to blow up the incoming missiles before they hit? He said that they had 10 impacting points and 300 missiles, but what did they have to prevent or protect the people from incoming missiles? Did they just have the people bunker down and ride it out and hope for the best?
@Rockyfan10060 Actually around the time The Day After was made, there was talk about setting up a laser defense system designed to shoot down ICBMs using a laser. It was nicknamed either by the defense department or the general public "The Star Wars project". It didnt work out, otherwise why do you keep hearing concern about nuclear programs in Iran & North Korea?
@DASCO2136 lasers were only one component of the Strategic Defense Initiative. The "Star Wars" label was applied by left-wing US politicians who did not want the US to be able to defend itself. SDI was largely credited by Soviet leadership with forcing them to finally give up on the Cold War and accept steep arms cutbacks and the freedom of Eastern Europe. The lasers were abandoned post Cold-War but other aspects maintained. The US today has a limited strategic defense system based in Alaska.
@aspect974 acutally it was the right-wingers who called it star wars, hoping to cash in on the movie's popularity, to get the general public to help pay for their milt-trillion dollar boondoggle of a program, after all Regan had already put us into massive debt to match imaginary soviet spending
@Rockyfan10060 20,000 meaning all kinds of warheads from short range tactical warheads to the ICBMs. So out of the 10,000 nuclear missiles Russia had (assuming both sides are half & half), i bet maybe 1,000 of them are ICBMs and if that is the case, that doesnt necessarily mean they send all of them to the US. They probably send some to major cities or strategic targets in Europe, Canada and other places around the world.
In reality wouldn't those cars be close enough to be blown into the sky be the force of the expplosion? The wind after the detonation would be very powerful.
@relfexreaction Remember how there was an airburst explosion over Kansas City? When a nuclear weapon detonates, it sends out an electro magnetic pulse or EMP which shuts down electricity within its blast radius. Since cars and bikes have batteries that are electricly charged, an EMP would eliminate it which means they dont work
"Like a test like a warning" everytime that silly bitch saids that I have an amusing image of the missiles turning around and flying back into the silo the silo doors closing and the the EBS saying "Due to lightened political attitudes and a man love hug from Andropov and Raegan Nuclear Armageddon has been averted"
Yes you wish you stupid tubby horn rimmed glassed cow.......
@Hauntedman1 It's denial. Earlier she showed a fairly sophisticated understanding of history and geopolitical politics, but now she's speaking from her gut. Wouldn't you under the same circumstances?
Anyone who wants to get an idea of what could happen in the event of a nuclear exchange should do searches on declassified SIOP Single Integrated Operational Plan. From what I read believe me, a LOT of places would be hit!!! The SIOP plans basically make The Day After look like a battle of party poppers and firecrackers.
@MNRRConductor2006 Pay particular attention to the National Strategic Target List (NSTL) and keep in mind that the unwritten rule that for each action there is an equal and immediate reaction.
Was that an E.M.P. at 5:09? Causing all the electricity, including ignition systems in cars, to fail? Is that separate from of inclusive of a nuclear airburst, as opposed ot one that gets detonated on the ground?
@dariodepiante Since the atomic energy of a groundburst is more centralized, whereas an airburst distributes energy over a wider area. A high-yield warhead detonated at a very high altitude would theoretically disrupt the electromagnetic field over a large geographical area; in theory, it's possible for just one warhead to disrupt the field from coast to coast.
@lothartheterrible Yeah, during the nuke testing days it was recorded that some of the US and French atmospheric tests over the Pacific disrupted radio stations as far away as Chile and Argentina. In a war scenario, I think it's a good bet that there would be numerous atmospheric detonations over the target territory, in hopes of knocking out the enemies' ability to respond. Air Force One is supposed to be "shielded" from EMP...Idk if it's true. But I'd say there are places that are shielded.
@lothartheterrible In other words----An EMP bomb detonated over Kansas City if strong enough, can knock out all electrical power in the United States?
@nickpaulie One can only assume they eventually ran out of supplies and were forced to exit the shelter or eventually starved to death. Either way, they were equally fucked.
@lothartheterrible The chances are much better that they were killed when the silo, which is a primary target for a Soviet warhead, was destroyed by the Russki nuke that had it's name on it. The silos can withstand an attack--if the bomb goes off far enough away--but not a direct hit. The Russians would use there most accurate, silo-based weapons for military targets; like silos, bases, White House, etc. and their mobile, slightly less reliable/accurate ones, for metro and rural cities/towns.
I'm also curious if a pair of wraparound polarized sunglasses can shield your eyes from most being flash blinded. Shit Oakleys are designed to withstand the impact of a 4-6" metal shard so I'm thinking maybe they'd protect against intense light too.
Did anyone else notice the little black girl's plaid oufit? when people are stampeding they show someone with a plaid outfit being trampled. sucks to be her.
Per the story line of The Day After, it is illustrated that the Soviets launched the preemptive strike first. The government stated in the making of this movie they would support this movie providing it was shown that the Soviets rather than the US would launch first, and that the US would launch ONLY in retaliation.
The thing about this is it largely defeats the whole point of making the movie. It was made to try to prevent ww3 by showing the public what would happen. If the enemy shoots first then the public have no control over that, but they do have some control over what their own country does. I like to think that the americans were preparing to make a first strike when the soviets launched, that way they managed to get their missiles out of the ground with so much time to spare.
@lothartheterrible Thanks a lot, thats very useful! Im i may i would recommend you a movie 'Die Wolke'. Its about a breakdown in a german nuclear power plant, more from the emotional side, from a teenager's POV. It shows that even 20 years after Chernobyl we are still unprepared for disasters like that. Hope you speak german, because sadly there are no subs for it.
@lothartheterrible In laymans terms it's a massive electrical surge that instantly blows out power systems in everything. IE totally out of commission. However it's been determined that if a car was turned off during the EMP it has a good chance of being drivable.
@MasterJediKyleKatarn Yes, I know what EMP is; that was in response to another person's post, I just didn't feel like explaining it. You did a good job with this though; do you mind if I quote this when people ask?
@lothartheterrible Go ahead. Am I the only one who thinks this movie is totally fucking depressing though. All those end of the world movies make me wanna throw up. Oh btw the military has learned many years ago that an enclosed steel box(like NORAD's structure) does shield against EMP's. If it's still on spiketv's site. The Surviving Disaster episode with the terrorist nuke. In that video the flashblinded victim eventually regained their sight.
From what it looks like, they were trying to imply that the first nukes will be high altitude neutron warheads which have a very strong EMP pulse - henceforth all the electricity getting knocked out.
This doesn't make sense to me since hydrogen bombs are so powerful that an EMP attack is unnecessary. Perhaps the writers thought it makes sense since Oklahoma City area is portrayed to have deep, dug-in silos and a neutron bomb EMP attack could be used to prevent the use of the missile silos.
@livkivi At 5:09 a high yield nuclear bomb is detonated in the ionosphere. When this happens it creates a large electrical surge known as EMP (electromagnetic pulse) that destroys almost everything electrical. It is used to prevent computers from working to launch our own missiles
@livkivi Nuclear detonations create massive electromagnetic bursts that fry electronics. That bright flash that caused the outages were nuclear warheads detonated high in the atmosphere to produce just that effect to prevent any sort defense against the actual warheads intended to hit the ground.
@livkivi The fall of the electricity is because of the electro magnetic impulse of the nuclear blast. As i know it continues not long after the blast-no more that 1 minute.
@livkivi u mean the cars and everything stopping because of the nuke in the sky? thats an emp. electromagnetic pulse is when its exploded outside of the magnetic feild of the earth creating a shock of electromagnetic waves which distrupt the eletronics of stuff like cars,clocks,phones everything
@zenithomega19 Electro magnetic pulse baby, nuclear band sends it out for miles, everything electronic shuts down.. Right before the last blast you will ever see..
No. In fact, this is the reason there is so much stock footage used in this sequence; the US military only agreed to let Meyer use missile launch test films if it was made clear in the film that the Soviets fired first. Meyer refused, and was thus forced to use 20 year old footage of obsolete missiles being launched.
In the American psyche in those days all the way back to the 50s, it was always believed and illustrated in every Cold War film and documentary that is an attack occurs, the Soviets were the first to do it, be it provoked or by surprise.
In NZ we had sirens to alert if any Japanese Aerial attack was inbound(which never happened) and now they are used to alert emergency services in rural areas to a crash or fire.
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olivialover75 4 days ago
@olivialover75 Uhhh....huh?
lothartheterrible 3 days ago
Look at all the hysterical people- in a real-world scenario, if they acted like this, there'd be no rebuilding at all. EVERY PERSON in this stupid movie is a drama queen.
whiskerchild 2 weeks ago
@whiskerchild IT WAS A FUCKING NUCLEAR WAR. You know, EVERYBODY FUCKING DYING. Either mercifully in the blasts or painfully and slowly of radiation sickness/burns/contaminated water/no food/ect. You tell me;; wouldn't you freak out if you knew you were about to die?
Jakezing 2 weeks ago
@Jakezing
No, it wouldn't freak me out. Wouldn't freak a lot of other people out either: gotta keep your head on your shoulders to help others to the bitter end and help yourself go out with grace.
Not sayin' I'd like it, but..........just saying the above.
whiskerchild 2 weeks ago
@whiskerchild: I'm sorry, whiskerchild, but Jakezing's right: we're not talking about an earthquake or a hurricane, we're talking about a FULL-SCALE nuclear war in which tens of millions could easily die, in the U.S. alone.
JohnnyDart76 1 week ago
Just drop it on top of me. I would not want to be around after.
holmsatlarge 4 weeks ago
@holmsatlarge i live by SAC so... i get to die early =D ... i feel sad i find dying first is good
Jakezing 2 weeks ago
It's all Private Cowboy's fault!
kaptkarl 1 month ago
The lucky ones die first....
FloridaLawDawg 1 month ago
5:00 and thats why i will never live in a city... id still go for vacations but after 9/11 im not gonna live in one
TheDecimater1000 1 month ago in playlist Nuclear Holocaust Theatre
There is a continuity error. The airmen indicated that Beale had been taken out already then we see staff a Beale reporting to the Looking Glass aircraft. Unless I heard the conversation between the airmen incorrect?
ClearSmashDrop 1 month ago
@ClearSmashDrop Unintentional continuity error; since the footage in question was culled from another film (the 1979 PBS mockumentary "First Strike") it was fairly easy to get jumbled in production.
lothartheterrible 1 month ago
Electro magnetic pulse immobilizes shit !!
silviasboy 1 month ago
I know this is just a movie, but the 1st detonation which was aerial and meant to destroy the power grid and telecommunication via EMP would have taken out the starters in the cars as well.
sinusbradycardia 2 months ago in playlist day after
OMG !!!! The special effects of people burning and turning into dust are soo bad BUT STILL, you can feel the horror. Man, I got chills, in a bad way. Dunno if today,s effect would make it more realistic but hot damn that shit is scary
SandmanCOD 3 months ago
Am i the only one who saw the blonde run in circles?
Freepepsi42 4 months ago in playlist Nuclear Holocaust Theatre
This movie, IMO, beats the hell out of any horror movie for a good scare, even in the post Cold War era.
DannyB587 4 months ago
I was 15 when the movie came out, and though I didn't get any nightmares from it, the ground zero victims getting skeletonized and vaporized was the most disturbing part of the film to me.
warlaker 5 months ago
@warlaker I was 7 when this came out..I had plenty of nightmares because of this scene
kaptkarl 1 month ago
I remember watching this movie when it came out. Scared the hell outta me. I'm so glad the Cold War is over. Hopefully Hiroshima and Nagasaki are the last cities to ever be destroyed with nuclear weapons.
sritger 5 months ago
The bit where the black guy at 5.35 runs down into the ditch is a lot like Pasolini's 'Gospel According to St Matthew' where Judas runs into the gulch. Nice primal idea.
3replybiz 6 months ago
at 05:10 was that an EMP strike or somethin else
TheSRBIN3 7 months ago
@TheSRBIN3,
Yes. That first, high-altitude nuke was most likely an EMP strike, which killed most electrical systems. Then, the killer warheads impacted.
knightryderrwn 6 months ago
for those who keep saying Threads is better, the end of the film does say things could've been a lot worse, so in a sense they're admitting this isn't as best or as realistic as it could be in real life, Threads is in effect an example of that more realistic brutal period. It's like Testament, On the Beach, Miracle Mile, Terminator films, When the Wind Blows all deal with nuclear war, but different extremes of the situation. Good work on the uploading Lothartheterrible.
MDBowron 7 months ago
We'd be making the rubble bounce.
ChrisDutch 7 months ago
It's always puzzled me a bit...when the EMP from the high-altitude blast knocks out all the power, we see people in all manner of activities - on the phone, at the movies (?) - in darkness. And when the bombs hit KC we see people in random activities - weddings, playgrounds, schoolrooms, etc. being vaporized. But...the sirens were going off, weren't they? The EBS was screaming its head off, wasn't it? Wouldn't EVERYBODY be freaking the fuck out?
Yeah, I know, dramatic license...
snidelywhiplash 7 months ago
@snidelywhiplash
From reading I've down, stats say it would have taken just over one hour to have alerted the whole of the country.
Most of the sirens had generators they kick on if the grid goes down, an EMP doesn't knock out everything electrical. There is a gentlemen on Youtube who has a channel solely dedicated to Cold War era sirens, Survey Meters, Geiger Counters, ect...
Even if people had taken cover, chances of survival in a non hardened structure are slim.
Weps21 7 months ago
What confuses me is that in the beginning of this part, you hear one of the guards at the base state that Beale AFB was knocked out... but a little bit later we hear the phone call where the radar tech says "Missile Warning this is Beale, confidence is high I repeat confidence is high." Is it a continuity error or are we to assume the guard was mistaken?
jjobie 8 months ago
@jjobie Unintentional continuity error. There are many throughout the movie; this one probably a direct result of the fact that the scene in question was recycled from another film.
lothartheterrible 8 months ago
@lothartheterrible Infact it was recycled form "First strike"if I'm not wrong
LuiginoCisalpino 6 months ago
@jjobie As lothar mentioned there are many continuity errors. Many of them are due to the fact that ABC originally wanted the film to be a two-part miniseries (over Nicholas Meyer's objections). When the network couldn't find sponsors for any scenes after the attack, however, they reversed their decision and told Meyer to edit the film down so it could be shown in just one night. This doesn't really pertain to the error you mentioned, but it may explain several others.
Lotmeister 7 months ago
@jjobie It was not a continuity error, imo. Nicholas Meyers, the film's director was being pressured by the U.S. government to have the Soviets launch first. He managed to do this by putting the sequence of events in reverse order. That is the most logical explanation. The political implications of this film gave great concern to both ABC and the U.S. government, so it seems likely that Meyers caved to the pressure and had the Soviets launch ICBM's first, but did so in a not so obvious way.
lydiahoggarth 6 months ago
@lydiahoggarth Yeah, well, your opinion is wrong. To have Beale be destroyed, and then magically be undestroyed in the following scene does nothing to support a Soviet first strike. The scene in which the airman says "Missile warning, this is Beale..." is recycled footage from "First Strike"; it was shot in 1979 before this film was even conceived. In the course of forming your hypothesis, it would have helped for you to have noted that his name is Nicholas Meyer, not "Meyers".
lothartheterrible 6 months ago
@lothartheterrible Try out this explaination. The storytelling is not linear. The guard mentioning Beal AFB is talking after Beal has already been destroyed. Then a flash forward to scenes of Beal AFB putting out warning before it is destroyed... and we see the sirens going off etc.
In the movie (propaganda film) First Strike that the Beal scene is taken from that's basically what happens. Beal detects the first strike then...boom.
Quantumgeometer 6 months ago
@lothartheterrible While we're talking about this sequence, I have another question which may or may not be valid. In the scene where Jason Robards gets caught on the highway during the attack, we see one warhead go off, forming a mushroom cloud; a little bit later there's a second detonation which appears to be pretty close to the first one. Wouldn't the shock front from the second explosion have partially (at least) dissipated the mushroom cloud from the first one?
jjobie 4 months ago
@jjobie Oh, I agree; it's silly as hell. Now. 28 years ago, it was horrifying.
lothartheterrible 2 months ago
@jjobie 1983, made for TV; this was as good as it gets. Nick Meyer is a director, not a nuclear physicist. When one considers that they made the mushroom clouds by injecting colored ink into a water tank, I think that the results are satisfactory.
lothartheterrible 1 month ago
@jjobie Or that one guard had bad information...it happens, you know.
craigkbryant 5 months ago
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@jjobie Not only that, but they
wardenphil 3 months ago
emp has been around since the 1st nuclear weapon was even tested, so it wass devloped by the americans, but both countries hav the technolgy exept the us emp burst are more powerful
ps3bandit8 9 months ago
@ps3bandit8 any country or other entity with the capability to detonate an atomic/nuclear weapon would of course have the ability to use emp, since it's part of the effect of detonation..as for the US having a more powerful emp effect, how do you arrive at that conclusion ?
ITILII 8 months ago
@ITILII higher yield nuiclear weapons, currently the russians highest yield weapon is between 550-800kt while ours was a 9mt b53 bomb(until last year after they were all dismanteld) but now its the 1.2mt b83 and i am almost assured that we hav dedicated EMP type weapons, decades furtehr in advancement than the russians or chinese
ps3bandit8 8 months ago
@ps3bandit8 Yes, this is important because our five matches will light a pool of gasoline so much faster than their three.
lothartheterrible 8 months ago
@lothartheterrible srry, not a fan of poetry, do u mind putting that into english for me
ps3bandit8 8 months ago
I'll do my best to translate into terms you can grasp: lulz like omg, u doodz don't understand that when nukez killz every1 it dont matter who has the bigger ones; we all die anyway!!11!1!!! lol omg wtf lol.
Better?
lothartheterrible 8 months ago
VAPORIZED!!!!!!!!!!!!
Crussman499 9 months ago
LOL LOL - @1:43 - it always makes me laugh... let' s get this straight, atomic bombs are gonna level your city, and you and 100,000 other people are going to be stuck in a traffic jam staying on the right side of the road instead of thinking, hey, the opposite lane is EMPTY!! LOL
firebirdhome 9 months ago 2
@firebirdhome And people finding things to laugh about in movies depicting the end of the world always made me weep for humanity. Go figure...
lothartheterrible 9 months ago 2
@lothartheterrible
They call it the humor of the gallows
mushmouth4life 9 months ago
@mushmouth4life
They also call it "unfounded internet pedantry".
lothartheterrible 9 months ago
@firebirdhome how is this funny u stupid satan worshipper
evilicecubes 9 months ago
My ass would be running towards the light and not for "cover"; seems better than "surviving" the aftermath.
HippyWitchGal 10 months ago
Almost 30 years later and this movie still makes me very uneasy. 1983 when it came out it scared me shitless...guess I made a little progress.
37stepp 10 months ago
Ho. Le. Sh**.
EternallyRound 10 months ago
The electromagnetic Pulse Happens when At the Moment of the Atomic Explosion not Before like in this film.
wilhelmschumann 10 months ago
@wilhelmschumann What do you think the big, bright flash was right before the EMP? It was a high altitude airburst.
lothartheterrible 10 months ago
@lothartheterrible The big bright flash was a nuke. Nukes that are airbursted (usually megaton warheads) cause a greater EMP affect than those that hit their target. Depending on the altitude of the airburst (and the power of the warhead) will determine the area of affect. Not sure what the altitude is for this one, but I've read that if one is airbursted in the upper atmosphere (probably the phase 2 stage of an ICBM launce) it's EMP can wipe out electronics in half or the whole country.
765Genobreaker 8 months ago
@765Genobreaker Is that what that was? Gee, thank you; I was having a bear of a time ascertaining what that bright flash was in this movie *depicting a nuclear missile exchange*. I understand the technicality of how nuclear weapons function just as much as a lay person should, thanks; but if there is anything else you would like to point out, Captain Obvious, you're more than welcome to do so.
lothartheterrible 8 months ago
@wilhelmschumann y'know..the russians were developing EMP bombs, that would only detonate an EMP. it was their battleplan: stop all communications, THEN let the nukes hit
Chernabog135 9 months ago
6:55. The kid is toast from seeing the flash. HIs corneas were destroyed in milliseconds.
genenco1 10 months ago
The order they put the *First Strike* video makes it seem the United States went all out (or, at least, strategic) first. We got the inbound warning *after* we'd launched our ICBM's. I don't recall picking up on that when I watched it on broadcast air.
newdarnaccount 10 months ago
Ya know what is not so funny? I bet someone that due to an explosion of a smaller bomb, wouldn't know the difference from this depiction of a really large bomb.
Really doesn't make a difference in the scheme of things. You die from a car bomb, you die from a bomb on an airplane or you die from a really big fancy nuclear bomb...
I think it ends up the same....
And, honestly, I don't think it matters who made the bomb...
Why don't those that die care about that?
Crazy
kittkatt1975 10 months ago
@kittkatt1975 Conventional explosives and IEDs wouldn't end up leaving the Earth ruined for decades after their use in a global war.
The Day After and Threads were all about getting people to realize that fact. Nuclear weapons aren't just "bigger and fancier explosives." After a global thermonuclear war, life on Earth would be left in serious jeopardy.
HooshIsASoup 10 months ago
Why was this movie so panned when it came out? I don't mean by rightwingers who don't want to know all the consequences of war, but I mean artistically. What was so bad about it? Just because it's not "Threads" doesn't make it a bad movie. Both are great, terrifying movies.
mphello 11 months ago
@mphello It wasn't; it was nominated for several Emmy awards. It didn't start getting "panned" until people on here started turning it into a pissing contest over which country made the better movie: the US or the UK. My stance is this: both films served their purpose in that they scared the bejesus out of people, and made them *think*.
lothartheterrible 11 months ago 3
@lothartheterrible Thank you for that insight. I agree: BOTH movies made people think.
I love the hypocrisy of those who complain: "the films are a 'joke' because they don't show the horrors of nuclear war enough". So, what do these people want? An actual limited nuclear war demonstration?
mphello 11 months ago 2
Remember, a lot of them are from a generation jaded by CGI and bright, flashy objects that illicit lots of "oohs" and "ahhs", where it is about spectacle more than story. If one wants to split hairs, "Terminator 2" featured a much more frighteningly realistic depiction of a nuclear attack than either of these films, but even it was more about style than substance.
lothartheterrible 11 months ago 6
@lothartheterrible Yes, the short 20-second nuclear attack in T2 is very good and scary, but I wouldn't say it was better - either technically or artistically - than the ones in TDA or Threads.
I'm from the same "generation", but I've never let tv or CGI go to my head. I just RECYCLED a perfectly working giant 70-kilogram cathode-ray-tube tv in order to free up space in my house.
And, I don't care about movies: i.e. I could die happy if I never see another movie in my life.
mphello 11 months ago
@mphello Oh, I didn't say it was "better"; I said it was "(more) realistic". I succumbed to the allure of a plasma big screen, but mainly for sports and the occasional video game; I quit watching movies en masse right about the time Hollywood started running out of ideas (in other words, in about 1999 or so).
lothartheterrible 11 months ago
@mphello Actually nuclear scientists thanked James Cameron for the nuclear attack sequence in Terminator 2, saying it was the most accurate portrayal of what would happen in a nuclear attack.
BoukenCrimson 10 months ago
@BoukenCrimson Really? Cool! Yes, Cameron did an awesome job. It's just that that sequence was too short.
mphello 10 months ago
i was born in 1981 i think i was 4 maybe 5 when i seen this, it was the scarcest movie that has haunted me for years after seeing it i thought it was really going to happen i could int sleep my mom was like dot worry it was only a movie and still i was still terrified i thought it was the end so many nights i couldn't sleep this was a horror move i think it was the most terrifying movie i have ever seen ,,,it really messed me up seeing this movie when i was young!!!!!!! :(
capichow 11 months ago
@noobcrusher141 That's because the producers took clips from the First Strike documentary and jumbled their sequence, so that it wouldn't be clear who launched first.
In the documentary, the clip of Beale AFB and the staff doing a confidence warning is one of the first scenes that happens, because that documentary is about the Soviet Union launching a surprise attack on the USA's nuclear forces.
HooshIsASoup 11 months ago
When this came out I was 12. I remember being mad that my mom wouldn't let me watch it. Now I know why! Jeez louise!
hulgawest 11 months ago
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LETS HOPE THIS WILL HAPPEN TO AMERICA ONE DAY FOR REAL AND GET WIPED OUT OF THE MAP ..... FUCK YOU AMERICAN BASTARDS
zigosaleh555 11 months ago
@zigosaleh555 Yeah, you're welcome for that whole "getting rid of Saddam" thing we did for Kuwait in '91.
lothartheterrible 10 months ago
Better pray to God it never really happens..
antidiz 11 months ago
There´s no place to run and hide.
CATTOBAR 11 months ago
You see a launch....you're fucked.
liveecarbme 1 year ago
@ Gekido:
You are correct. Those are films of atomic and nuclear tests during the Cold War. Those are not "cool effects.". You can see much of that and other footage in the documentaries "The Day After Trinity". Or "Day One".
ChadmannPHEA2 1 year ago
All of the people that were outside and not killed by the immediate blast all suffered leathal doses of radiation. The black soldier, the old Doctor, the nurse was probably outside too.
poodtang1 1 year ago
8:00 - 8:10 that was a cool looking tree effect
ShaneCopseysTV 1 year ago
@ShaneCopseysTV
I believe that sequence (along with a few of the other explosion parts) was from the videos that were shot during nuclear tests the government conducted.
GekidoYuuga 1 year ago
Do any cities still have nuclear attack sirens? I'm actually more worried about silent weapons like chemical or biological attacks. You wouldn't know until after it was used.
corky7ca 1 year ago
@corky7ca Yes. they are still widely used to alert for severe weather, particularly in cities in the Midwestern US.
lothartheterrible 1 year ago
@corky7ca
i live in winnipeg I think we still have one, its a big horn, like huge
capichow 11 months ago
@capichow Do they use them for weather up there as well? I know Manitoba gets its share of tornadoes...
lothartheterrible 11 months ago
u have to lol at the fact of the woman seeing the missles launch and she says "is it like a test?"
residentevil568 1 year ago
I remember all those goofy x-ray special effects! I watched this on tv when I was a kid.
phorn123456 1 year ago
After the sirens go off, if the missiles take 30 minutes to reach the US from Russia, how long will the sirens run for? Do they set the sirens off right when they detect a launched missile from the USSR?
Rockyfan10060 1 year ago
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this is beautifull and it will happen. We (Russia China) are tired of you yank bitches allways policeing evrybody, fuck this BS kingdom America, Revelation 18 shows America`s future
mihail2000 1 year ago
@mihail2000 You're using the wrong avatar for a troll; it should be something obnoxiously trendy or edgy. Here's another tip: if you're going for irony, lambasting a country for "policing everybody" loses bite when it's coming from someone defending the largest remaining communist police state where human rights are not too terribly high on the priority list. BTW, I'm a teacher; the only people I "police" are my students. So fuck you.
lothartheterrible 1 year ago 11
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@lothartheterrible "defending the largest remaining communist police state where human rights are not too terribly high on the priority list."
Police state, maybe, but Russia is not a communist state, and hasn't been for decades.
oideroid 1 year ago
@oideroid I was talking about China, dumbass.
lothartheterrible 11 months ago
@mihail2000 so let me get this straight...you are coming down on the citizens of a police state? like the CITIZENS are the bad guys?? lol! do you normally go around insulting people where you are who have nothing to do with what their fucking sociopathic government does or is this strictly utube people based for you? you DO realize it's the bozos who sit in office that declare wars right? not the slaves who live their everyday lives....give your head a shake. EVOLVE stop DEvolving.
itstime4change13 10 months ago
@mihail2000 then again you are probably rh positive so devolving is just part of your nature. you seem to act like the money that shares your blood.
itstime4change13 10 months ago
It looks like DR Oates is still going the speed limit. Shit, he oughta be going as fast as that car will take him.
Rockyfan10060 1 year ago
I remember this coming on when I was a just 5yrs old.. This movie traumatized me so much, that it is embedded so deep in my brain I never forgot the name and the actors that were in this movie..
Lovetowatchyouwatch 1 year ago
They have a lot of the original nuclear testing clips from New Mexico in the movie. My grandparents use to tell us when we were little that they saw a very bright light coming from the South (in New Mexico) during all that nuclear testing. They knew that something wasn't right and wondered what was going on. Now, the testing sites were in southern New Mexico and my grandparents lived in northern New Mexico (Four Corners area). Scary information.
native4life4eva 1 year ago
We need a special bomb these days that when detonated it only wipes out black rappers!
begoneyoubum 1 year ago
EMP detonation. Another strategic use of the bombs. Interesting to read about.
4SCARECROWS 1 year ago 2
Interesting as a 10 year old watching this movie, I didn't understand the aerial detonation. I asked my grandmother why did the bomb go off so high above the ground. She had no answer. Of course when I found this uploaded on YouTube, I knew exactly what it was, strategic detonation for EMP.
sinusbradycardia 1 year ago
One thing that always sticks with me about this sequence is the businessman running into the shelter clutching his briefcase (starts at about 4:22), as if he's going to need any of his office papers anymore. On the other hand, in his panic the briefcase was probably his best link to his normal, everyday life, so of course he would want to hang on to it.
Lotmeister 1 year ago
Did the Military have any defnse for missiles at this time? Like anything to blow up the incoming missiles before they hit? He said that they had 10 impacting points and 300 missiles, but what did they have to prevent or protect the people from incoming missiles? Did they just have the people bunker down and ride it out and hope for the best?
Rockyfan10060 1 year ago
@Rockyfan10060 Actually around the time The Day After was made, there was talk about setting up a laser defense system designed to shoot down ICBMs using a laser. It was nicknamed either by the defense department or the general public "The Star Wars project". It didnt work out, otherwise why do you keep hearing concern about nuclear programs in Iran & North Korea?
DASCO2136 1 year ago
@DASCO2136 lasers were only one component of the Strategic Defense Initiative. The "Star Wars" label was applied by left-wing US politicians who did not want the US to be able to defend itself. SDI was largely credited by Soviet leadership with forcing them to finally give up on the Cold War and accept steep arms cutbacks and the freedom of Eastern Europe. The lasers were abandoned post Cold-War but other aspects maintained. The US today has a limited strategic defense system based in Alaska.
aspect974 1 year ago
@aspect974 acutally it was the right-wingers who called it star wars, hoping to cash in on the movie's popularity, to get the general public to help pay for their milt-trillion dollar boondoggle of a program, after all Regan had already put us into massive debt to match imaginary soviet spending
DaytonaRoadster 11 months ago
Does anyone know if the dude screaming about them"Pushing all the buttons" is Private Cowboy in Full Metal Jacket???
chocolatethunder1968 1 year ago
@chocolatethunder1968 Yes, it is; his name is Arliss Howard.
lothartheterrible 1 year ago
@lothartheterrible Thank you sir!!
chocolatethunder1968 1 year ago
But wait, if the US and Soviet Union had over 20,000 missiles why did the Russians send 300 according to the guy on the phone?
Rockyfan10060 1 year ago
@Rockyfan10060 20,000 meaning all kinds of warheads from short range tactical warheads to the ICBMs. So out of the 10,000 nuclear missiles Russia had (assuming both sides are half & half), i bet maybe 1,000 of them are ICBMs and if that is the case, that doesnt necessarily mean they send all of them to the US. They probably send some to major cities or strategic targets in Europe, Canada and other places around the world.
DASCO2136 1 year ago
In reality wouldn't those cars be close enough to be blown into the sky be the force of the expplosion? The wind after the detonation would be very powerful.
corky7ca 1 year ago
How long does it take to get the missiles out of the ground and launch them?
Rockyfan10060 1 year ago
truly the nucleare effect is horrible
stjepanzero 1 year ago
They one guy is from Full Metal Jacket
gaguy1967 1 year ago
why did the cars and the bike die?
relfexreaction 1 year ago
@relfexreaction Remember how there was an airburst explosion over Kansas City? When a nuclear weapon detonates, it sends out an electro magnetic pulse or EMP which shuts down electricity within its blast radius. Since cars and bikes have batteries that are electricly charged, an EMP would eliminate it which means they dont work
DASCO2136 1 year ago
@DASCO2136 thanks.
relfexreaction 1 year ago
You said that after this sequence was shown there were no commercials.
I know the answer is obvious but holy shit.
SoulBlade35 1 year ago
"Like a test like a warning" everytime that silly bitch saids that I have an amusing image of the missiles turning around and flying back into the silo the silo doors closing and the the EBS saying "Due to lightened political attitudes and a man love hug from Andropov and Raegan Nuclear Armageddon has been averted"
Yes you wish you stupid tubby horn rimmed glassed cow.......
Hauntedman1 1 year ago 2
@Hauntedman1 It's denial. Earlier she showed a fairly sophisticated understanding of history and geopolitical politics, but now she's speaking from her gut. Wouldn't you under the same circumstances?
Sharoney 1 year ago
@Hauntedman1 - LOL. I mean even as a 10 year old watching this movie, I'm like what?
sinusbradycardia 1 year ago
nuclear fusion is very powerful...
collegeboi317 1 year ago
why would you stand there and say whats going on!!!! SMH bitch we under attack
collegeboi317 1 year ago
Anyone who wants to get an idea of what could happen in the event of a nuclear exchange should do searches on declassified SIOP Single Integrated Operational Plan. From what I read believe me, a LOT of places would be hit!!! The SIOP plans basically make The Day After look like a battle of party poppers and firecrackers.
MNRRConductor2006 1 year ago
@MNRRConductor2006 Pay particular attention to the National Strategic Target List (NSTL) and keep in mind that the unwritten rule that for each action there is an equal and immediate reaction.
lothartheterrible 1 year ago
@MNRRConductor2006 could you link me to more information on this subject?
killswitch445 1 year ago
Was that an E.M.P. at 5:09? Causing all the electricity, including ignition systems in cars, to fail? Is that separate from of inclusive of a nuclear airburst, as opposed ot one that gets detonated on the ground?
dariodepiante 1 year ago
@dariodepiante Since the atomic energy of a groundburst is more centralized, whereas an airburst distributes energy over a wider area. A high-yield warhead detonated at a very high altitude would theoretically disrupt the electromagnetic field over a large geographical area; in theory, it's possible for just one warhead to disrupt the field from coast to coast.
lothartheterrible 1 year ago
@lothartheterrible Yeah, during the nuke testing days it was recorded that some of the US and French atmospheric tests over the Pacific disrupted radio stations as far away as Chile and Argentina. In a war scenario, I think it's a good bet that there would be numerous atmospheric detonations over the target territory, in hopes of knocking out the enemies' ability to respond. Air Force One is supposed to be "shielded" from EMP...Idk if it's true. But I'd say there are places that are shielded.
guns4good 1 year ago
@lothartheterrible In other words----An EMP bomb detonated over Kansas City if strong enough, can knock out all electrical power in the United States?
DASCO2136 1 year ago
@DASCO2136 If the yield is high enough and it was detonated at the right altitude, theoretically yes.
lothartheterrible 1 year ago
@lothartheterrible Jesus. I would take not living with electricity over having my city destroyed by a nuclear bomb anyday of the week
DASCO2136 1 year ago
Man, this movie theater always has power outages!
Remembermylai 1 year ago
What happened with that soldiers who hide there under ground near the silo?
nickpaulie 1 year ago
@nickpaulie One can only assume they eventually ran out of supplies and were forced to exit the shelter or eventually starved to death. Either way, they were equally fucked.
lothartheterrible 1 year ago
@lothartheterrible The chances are much better that they were killed when the silo, which is a primary target for a Soviet warhead, was destroyed by the Russki nuke that had it's name on it. The silos can withstand an attack--if the bomb goes off far enough away--but not a direct hit. The Russians would use there most accurate, silo-based weapons for military targets; like silos, bases, White House, etc. and their mobile, slightly less reliable/accurate ones, for metro and rural cities/towns.
guns4good 1 year ago
@guns4good Yes, this is true. It would actually be better for them to go that way.
lothartheterrible 1 year ago
This scares the crap out of me, and by god, I'm not easy to scare.
thtben 1 year ago
I'm also curious if a pair of wraparound polarized sunglasses can shield your eyes from most being flash blinded. Shit Oakleys are designed to withstand the impact of a 4-6" metal shard so I'm thinking maybe they'd protect against intense light too.
MasterJediKyleKatarn 1 year ago
when nobody is going your way, you may be going the wrong way.
cmoursler3 1 year ago
Did anyone else notice the little black girl's plaid oufit? when people are stampeding they show someone with a plaid outfit being trampled. sucks to be her.
MasterJediKyleKatarn 1 year ago
So who makes the pre-emptive, the US or the Soviets?
launch4 1 year ago
@launch4 Does it matter? There are no winners in nuclear war.
livkivi 1 year ago
@livkivi I suppose not really. They'll be killed by a groundburst anyway. Just wondering that's all.
launch4 1 year ago
@launch4
Per the story line of The Day After, it is illustrated that the Soviets launched the preemptive strike first. The government stated in the making of this movie they would support this movie providing it was shown that the Soviets rather than the US would launch first, and that the US would launch ONLY in retaliation.
MNRRConductor2006 1 year ago
@MNRRConductor2006
The thing about this is it largely defeats the whole point of making the movie. It was made to try to prevent ww3 by showing the public what would happen. If the enemy shoots first then the public have no control over that, but they do have some control over what their own country does. I like to think that the americans were preparing to make a first strike when the soviets launched, that way they managed to get their missiles out of the ground with so much time to spare.
launch4 1 year ago
2:46, 50,000 people in a stadium seeing ICBM's fly out of their silos = VERY nasty mess.
TideatMileHigh 1 year ago
Electricity fell? Is that because of high radiation? And everything is so... real. This really can happen one day. We are such monsters
livkivi 1 year ago 7
@livkivi Google "EMP Effect". That's what happened to the electricity.
lothartheterrible 1 year ago
@lothartheterrible Thanks a lot, thats very useful! Im i may i would recommend you a movie 'Die Wolke'. Its about a breakdown in a german nuclear power plant, more from the emotional side, from a teenager's POV. It shows that even 20 years after Chernobyl we are still unprepared for disasters like that. Hope you speak german, because sadly there are no subs for it.
livkivi 1 year ago
@livkivi I speak Russian and Italian, but no German. >:-(
lothartheterrible 1 year ago
@lothartheterrible In laymans terms it's a massive electrical surge that instantly blows out power systems in everything. IE totally out of commission. However it's been determined that if a car was turned off during the EMP it has a good chance of being drivable.
MasterJediKyleKatarn 1 year ago
@MasterJediKyleKatarn Yes, I know what EMP is; that was in response to another person's post, I just didn't feel like explaining it. You did a good job with this though; do you mind if I quote this when people ask?
lothartheterrible 1 year ago
@lothartheterrible Go ahead. Am I the only one who thinks this movie is totally fucking depressing though. All those end of the world movies make me wanna throw up. Oh btw the military has learned many years ago that an enclosed steel box(like NORAD's structure) does shield against EMP's. If it's still on spiketv's site. The Surviving Disaster episode with the terrorist nuke. In that video the flashblinded victim eventually regained their sight.
MasterJediKyleKatarn 1 year ago
From what it looks like, they were trying to imply that the first nukes will be high altitude neutron warheads which have a very strong EMP pulse - henceforth all the electricity getting knocked out.
This doesn't make sense to me since hydrogen bombs are so powerful that an EMP attack is unnecessary. Perhaps the writers thought it makes sense since Oklahoma City area is portrayed to have deep, dug-in silos and a neutron bomb EMP attack could be used to prevent the use of the missile silos.
konman001 1 year ago
@livkivi At 5:09 a high yield nuclear bomb is detonated in the ionosphere. When this happens it creates a large electrical surge known as EMP (electromagnetic pulse) that destroys almost everything electrical. It is used to prevent computers from working to launch our own missiles
randrboy 1 year ago
@randrboy Thanks, thats useful. But arent the army's and government's computers somehow protected? Like by a Faraday cage?
livkivi 1 year ago
@livkivi Nuclear detonations create massive electromagnetic bursts that fry electronics. That bright flash that caused the outages were nuclear warheads detonated high in the atmosphere to produce just that effect to prevent any sort defense against the actual warheads intended to hit the ground.
improvingvisibility 1 year ago
@improvingvisibility Thanks for explaining. But i thought that militaries use something like Faraday cage to block EMP effect...
livkivi 1 year ago
@livkivi The fall of the electricity is because of the electro magnetic impulse of the nuclear blast. As i know it continues not long after the blast-no more that 1 minute.
nickpaulie 1 year ago
@livkivi u mean the cars and everything stopping because of the nuke in the sky? thats an emp. electromagnetic pulse is when its exploded outside of the magnetic feild of the earth creating a shock of electromagnetic waves which distrupt the eletronics of stuff like cars,clocks,phones everything
residentevil568 1 year ago
@livkivi The theory is that an electromagnetic pulse would fry electrical circuitry and disable anything that uses electricity to function.
ycdtotv 1 year ago
@livkivi its because of the electro magnetic pulse wave released as a by product of a nuclear explosion which causes electronics to stop working
catklyst 1 year ago
@livkivi EMP effect....
zenithomega19 1 year ago
@zenithomega19 Electro magnetic pulse baby, nuclear band sends it out for miles, everything electronic shuts down.. Right before the last blast you will ever see..
antidiz 11 months ago
Say that one guy who wants to "take his chances down there" played private Cowboy in FMJ.
bwd81977 1 year ago
was that Vir is heard and saw?
wolgreth 1 year ago
I heard that at first Nick Meyer wanted to have it so that the US fired first and the Russians retaliated. Is this True?
MrBennetzen 1 year ago
No. In fact, this is the reason there is so much stock footage used in this sequence; the US military only agreed to let Meyer use missile launch test films if it was made clear in the film that the Soviets fired first. Meyer refused, and was thus forced to use 20 year old footage of obsolete missiles being launched.
lothartheterrible 1 year ago
@MrBennetzen
In the American psyche in those days all the way back to the 50s, it was always believed and illustrated in every Cold War film and documentary that is an attack occurs, the Soviets were the first to do it, be it provoked or by surprise.
MNRRConductor2006 1 year ago
In NZ we had sirens to alert if any Japanese Aerial attack was inbound(which never happened) and now they are used to alert emergency services in rural areas to a crash or fire.