view
The War Game (Peter Watkins, 1966)
Sep
16
“In the next world war, I believe that both sides could stop before the ultimate destruction of cities so that both sides could retire for a period of ten years or so of post-attack recuperation, in which world wars four to eight could be prepared.”
– a leading American nuclear strategist
view
The Day the Earth Caught Fire (Val Guest, 1961)
May
23
Jeannie Craig (Janet Munro) trying to cool down in a bathtub. DP: Harry Waxman.
“Truly the light is sweet; and what a pleasant thing it is for the eyes to see the Sun.”
– Peter Stenning
view
Krakatit (Otakar Vávra, 1948)
Apr
26
International Chernobyl Disaster Remembrance Day
A man on a darkened, concrete runway, running towards a man-made structure, a mirage. DP: Václav Hanuš.
With the experience of yet another world war, and two devastating applications of science biggest terror, Karel Čapek's 1922 novel Krakatit [“Krakatoa”] anticipated and moulded the decades to come.
And R.U.R. is now, just around the corner.
view
Hanoi, martes 13 [Hanoi, Tuesday 13th] (Santiago Álvarez, 1968)
Dec
13
Tue
view
Peace, little girl [Daisy / Daisy Girl] (Sidney Myers, 1964)
Nov
3
1964
Monique Corzilius aka Monique Cozy as the Daisy Girl. DP: Drummond Drury.
“One… two… three… four… five… seven… six… six… eight… nine… nine…”
– Daisy Girl
view
Ladybug Ladybug (Frank Perry, 1963)
May
21
the End Of The World
In a scene evoking Ingmar Bergman's Det sjunde inseglet [The Seventh Seal] (1957), one of the older girls leads the younger children in dance on top of a hill. Their teacher Mrs Andrews (Nancy Marchand) plus two of her students walk along. DP: Leonard Hirschfield.
It's another school day in rural America when the #NuclearAttack alarm starts ringing. A teacher, instructed to calmly walk the kids home, tries to keep the youngest ones oblivious of the impending doom.
“Ladybug, ladybug,
Fly away home”
children's song
While the children walk, talk and sing, this thing up there, in the sky and in the mind, grows bigger.
view
Fail Safe (Sidney Lumet, 1964)
Apr
5
National Nebraska Day
General Black (Dan O'Herlihy) being briefed. DP: Gerald Hirschfeld.
The one that got bombed by Strangelove.
“You're talking about a different kind of war.”
– General Stark
Both Lumet's Fail Safe and #Kubrick's #ColdWar comedy came out in 1964, right after the #CubaCrisis. The world was awash with the realisation that the bomb, The Bomb, wasn't merely proverbial flexing. And when crisis happens, there are two options. One is to laugh, the other is to grasp. Sadly for Lumet, and the world, his Fail Safe was released while everyone was still too busy chuckling.
view
The Damned [These Are the Damned] (Joseph Losey, 1962)
Mar
19
National Automatic Door Day
An 11-year old boy, Henry (Kit Williams), opens a featureless door in a rock surface for a drenched King (Oliver Reed). DP: Arthur Grant.
An American tourist visiting Dorset is tricked by a prostitute, then falls victim to a youth gang controlled by volatile con King – a still very green Oliver Reed at his meanest. The trickster is King's sister, who confides in the American hoping to escape her brother's incestuous advances.
“I'm strange, all right! I'll show you just how strange I am!”
– King
The couple elopes to a nearby island, closely followed by King and his gang, where they find a group of #children, all contently living in an underground lab, with #AutomaticDoors only they can control.
They are the damned.
view
The Incredible Shrinking Man (Jack Arnold, 1957)
Mar
5
National Scott Day
Scott Carey (Grant Williams) standing in a palm of someone's hand, his arms outstretched as if pleading. DP: Ellis W. Carter.
Despite its sensationalist pulpy title and #ColdWar premise, Jack Arnold's adaptation of the Richard Matheson's The Shrinking Man (1956) is an existentialist treatise.
“A strange calm possessed me. I thought more clearly than I had ever thought before – as if my mind were bathed in a brilliant light.”
– Scott Carey
The Incredible Shrinking Man plays with the understanding of what it means to be acknowledged as a human, and one's place in the world. The story is told through the eyes of the titular Shrinking Man – Scott Carey – who after being exposed to strange fog, finds himself increasingly lost in this world.