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A timely rescreening of the movie that traumatised a generation. I first saw this at a ridiculously young age (80s parenting) and was never quite the same again, having seen a perfect rendition of the world I inhabited being utterly annihilated.
I see that Grave of the Fireflies is also screening on Netflix at the moment - might make it a double bill.
Never seen Threads.
Never watching Grave of the Fireflies again since having kids.
More famous for his book and film Kes
One of my favourite films, funny and very sad
Threads, definitely not funny
The definitive answer to my 8 year old’s questions about what it was like growing up during the Cold War.
Don’t think I’ve ever seen threads so will watch it
Don’t think I’ve ever seen threads so will watch it
I think I was too young when it first aired. I'm aware of its reputation though, it's notoriously bleak.
Watched it back in the day when I was a teenager. Scared the shit out of me.
Won't be watching it again unless they do a musical version.
I Watched it as a 12 year old in 1984, I grew up about 20 miles from Finningley and 10 miles from Sheffield city center. Scared me and all my mates to death, far more than any of the video nasties doing the rounds back then!
I didn't catch it when it first came out, but being a RAF brat and loving on or near bases, it brings back the underlying tension at the time.
I was a baby when it came out so I've heard about it but never seen it.
The reviews on IMDb make it sound horrifying.
Does it have the same impact in 2024? Or is it like watching old Dr Who with the cheap makeup and wobbly sets etc?
Never watching Grave of the Fireflies again since having kids.
Amazing film but won't be watching again
Recording threads
I remember bits of Threads but didn't really watch it as I was about 12
I was a baby when it came out so I’ve heard about it but never seen it.
The reviews on IMDb make it sound horrifying.
Does it have the same impact in 2024? Or is it like watching old Dr Who with the cheap makeup and wobbly sets etc?
Watch it and let us know how you get on. I'm genuinely fascinated to know how its received now, as it traumatised me quite a bit the first time round, I now realise.
I'm not sure if I can watch it again. I'll decide tomorrow.
Does it have the same impact in 2024? Or is it like watching old Dr Who with the cheap makeup and wobbly sets etc?
I think it still stands up very well. It's very focused on the human experience, so isn't overly reliant on effects sequences. The attack scenes use a lot of documentary footage, which obviously helps.
The most disturbing aspect has always been how real it feels (lots of non-actors on-screen probably helped with this).
The young couple doing up the flat for a new life together whilst listening to the worsening global situation on the radio...
Very powerful stuff.
They are trying to find the guy that played the iconic traffic warden with all the bandages on, it was on the BBC Webby. Cant remember the reason, guessing it's due to the anniversary.
I think I was too young when it first aired. I’m aware of its reputation though, it’s notoriously bleak.
I was only 12 in 1984 and living in Argyll at the time, not far from Dunoon so growing up we knew from drills to stay away from windows and dive under the desks at school if anything happened. Probably just as well we didn’t have a tv, where we lived there was no signal so I guess all we would have known of a strike was the big bright light in the sky.
They are trying to find the guy that played the iconic traffic warden with all the bandages on, it was on the BBC Webby.
He's been found, apparently. Radio 4 did a doc on the movie last week: a local radio station in Sheffield surprised a couple of superfans, who'd been trying to track him down for ages, by wheeling him out, live on air.
He’s been found, apparently. Radio 4 did a doc on the movie last week: a local radio station in Sheffield surprised a couple of superfans, who’d been trying to track him down for ages, by wheeling him out, live on air.
That's great, cheers for sharing, didn't know he'd been found!
When I was younger, we had a physics teacher who told us what to do in the event of a nuclear blast. Keen I suppose to show differences between the speed of light and the speed of sound.
He said that light travels faster, and the flash would most likely blind you. So what to do was you were to clap your hands over your ears so that when you go blind, you dont go deaf as well
Having just read the Wiki summary, I thinks it’s best I don’t watch it
Defensible. Know thyself.
I believe it was based (loosely) on a simulated attack called Square Leg
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Square_Leg
Remember Threads and those times well. My dad was on the Polaris Submarines.
Very scary film.
I read a load of Barry Hines stuff in the 80's and 90's. The Blinder, Kes, The Gamekeeper, The Heart of It.
I'm sure I read a novel based on Threads but I can't find any record of it? Anyone else remember it? Or have I just imagined it????
Live about 15 miles from Sheff. Will watch it to see what it looked like 40 odd years ago. I was too young to have seen the film the first time around.
Going to watch it for nostalgia of 80s Sheffield. Saw it first time round. Our sixth form college (now a steakhouse and wedding venue) hosted the sirens for south of Middlesbrough and had regular tests, which together with sirens for chemical leaks from ICI et al, kept us on edge somewhat.
There's a podcast hosted by someone who watched Threads as a young child and it absolutely traumatised her.
Looks at the Protect and Survive stuff from the 80's.
https://shows.acast.com/atomichobo
Watched it at the time as a callow teenager and was a bit Kevin-and Perry about it, as I recall. Watched it again as a download about four years ago - Holy Christ!!!
There’s a podcast hosted by someone who watched Threads as a young child and it absolutely traumatised her.
Looks at the Protect and Survive stuff from the 80’s.
> https://shows.acast.com/atomichobo
Julie's great. I used to work with her a long time ago; she's truly a one-off. Really enjoyed seeing her turn an obsession into a career as a podcaster and author. She even interviewed Threads director, Mick Jackson for her show.
We were shown it at comp school - can't remember being traumatised by it. In our rather shite school it was treated by us kids as a 'doss' session.
But everything around that era was about the cold war, so it was just another thing added to the TV output at the time.
One thing that era probably has done is harden me to news of wars. I look at what is going on in the middle east now and think it's just more of the same and will never change. Jokes of 'you've won a fortnight in Beirut' were very much a thing back in the 80's.
Although a lot of my generation (those of the late 60's early 70s) haven't had to fight in wars we've been bought up with the constant threat of one.
I have it on DVD (but no DVD player anymore) & can see parts of where it was filmed from my back bedroom.
I think if you have an awareness of what the 80s were like then it stands up quite well, otherwise its just looks old and low budget.
The very end is a bit rubbish, I get what they were trying to do but it feels rushed and disjointed.
I randomly watched it on my phone the other week it's on the Internet archive site. Watching it on a phone made it a bit more grim.
The political build up in the film is oddly horrifying.
I love Threads, it's terrifying. I do feel like there's a space in the modern market for a similar type of film now, with a higher budget and more potential for effects - but the 80s style and grainy grimness really adds to the theme.
+1 for Atomic Hobo. Like Julie I am darkly obsessed with nuclear war, always have been since I was a kid seeing Fylingdales RAF station. It's cool to have a regular podcast with loads of details about it for a total dweeb like me.
Thanks for the PSA - guess it will be a late night for me!
Is it on iPlayer? Didn't watch it last night because I would have missed the start (watched Morvern Callar instead) but now can't seem to find it. Was it a one-off broadcast?
It's on tonight.
With some chemical warfare and other nuclear stuff before it.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02kgkkg
The reason I watched it was because I had my tea break at work sitting on top of a command center in Oxford and my work mate had no idea what she was sitting on or the film. She watched Z for Zacharia too the old one because apparently they re made it
The War Game from 1966 is also worth a watch.
It was banned from broadcast until 1985.
I made the mistake of telling my work peer group about it, and despite my warnings they’ve all committed to watching it.
Which means I will also gulp, going by the comments above I can’t wait for the faces on tomorrow’s early morning group teams meeting.
She watched Z for Zacharia too the old one because apparently they re made it
I remember watching the original and in its own way, it was just as powerful as Threads, it's definitely recommended. The ending is extremely memorable imo.
The new one is Hollywoodized and is "ok" but it's a far more generic "end of the world" movie.
I love apocalyptic movies/ series, I find them oddly calming. They are a reminder that even on your worst day, boy, things could be so much worse.
That being said, I'm pretty convinced that during my lifetime there will be an atomic weapon used in anger (not necessarily by a state actor**), I'm just not sure if it will trigger a full out nuclear war. We shall see.
** Iran probed our border resilience a year or so back (during a border force strike) by getting a patsy to put some radioactive materials into a planes hold luggage. It wasn't a bomb, it was simply to see if the UK had the systems in place, particularly during a strike, to detect a potential bomb. It struck me at the time how little news coverage it got, you can make your own minds up as to why that was.
spooky_b329
Full Member
Is it a one off iPlayer screening or will it be on demand for a bit? I’d like to watch it but my evening shift yesterday snowballed into a 13 hour all nighter and I’m already nodding off ?
I'm not sure to be honest, it was on YT in the past but might have been taken down. Hopefully the bung it on iPlayer as I wont be able to watch it tonight either.
What a cheerful programme!
Yep, absolutely as grim as I remember!
When the Wind Blows next to see everyone into a blissful sleep?
Or perhaps, The Road?
To answer my earlier question, it's on iPlayer for 30 days
im intrigued. never watched it first time round so may give it a watch over the weekend.
It was a little late for me so I’ll try and watch it on streaming.
Probably worth reading this little beauty for maximum immersion of what it was like at the time.
Protect and survive
TBH I don’t remember being that phased at the time, I suppose you get used to it whilst living thru it.
We did have a good soundtrack to life then thou 🙂
Definitely grim, by today’s standards though it’s depressing for sure, but I can imagine in 1984 it would make pretty shocking viewing. My paranoia though did feed into the Middle East / Russia / US parallels of today, and together with the in-movie “government is ahead of the public behind the scenes “ narrative I did start to think, why is this stuff on TV right at this particular moment….
Watching it last night brought back Martin Amis's take:
Every morning, six days a week, I leave the house and drive a mile to the flat where I work. For seven or eight hours I am alone. Each time I hear a sudden whining in the air, or hear one of the more atrocious
impacts of city life, or play host to a certain kind of unwelcome thought, I can't help wondering how it might be. Suppose I survive. Suppose my eyes aren't pouring down my face, suppose I am untouched by
the hurricane of secondary missiles that all mortar, metal, and glass has abruptly become: suppose all this. I shall be obliged (and it's the last thing I'll feel like doing) to retrace that long mile home, through the
firestorm, the remains of the thousand-mile-an-hour winds, the warped atoms, the groveling dead.Then—God willing, if I still have the strength, and, of course, if they are still alive—I must find my wife and children and I must kill them.
Seen it as a young kid on first release, was more excited by it and it was all chat the next say about the explosions and searing heat. Seen it again a few years later when at high school when we were learning about nuclear bombs, the 80s was an odd time as there were many programmes about surviving a nuclear strike. The reality is your better off watching the strike from close up, at least it’ll be a swift death.
Guessing its not suitable for my 9 year old?
Absolutely not. Regularly features on Internet round ups of "most horrific non-horror film".
Watched again last night, for the first time since I watched it as a young teenager back in the 80's. I remembered a surprising amount, forgot that it's mostly vignettes rather than a film. Still impactful though. I remember being thankful that I lived (at the time) right next to an RAF base, and would be instantly vaporised. Nothing has changed my mind that that isn't still the very best outcome if anyone would be idiotic to turn the launch keys
This was a good book(let) that I had at the time (might still have, actually):
I even had an NBC suit I blagged off my mum's mate in the TA!
Is it a one off iPlayer screening or will it be on demand for a bit? I’d like to watch it but my evening shift yesterday snowballed into a 13 hour all nighter and I’m already nodding off ?
It is available for 30 days on iPlayer.
It's also on the Internet archive site.As is some great radio program from the Beeb.
The BBC should make this permanently available on iPlayer as a public service to remind us what will happen if we don’t manage Russia and Iran effectively.
Guessing its not suitable for my 9 year old?
Watch it yourself first, I would have let my eldest watch it at 9 but no so much my youngest.
why is this stuff on TV right at this particular moment….
Just to reassure you a little, I think it's on TV due to it being it's 40th anniversary year.
Never seen it before but know of it, watched til about 1130 then taped the rest to finish tonight.
Loved all the early 80's visuals .... A lady call Marjorie, Mothercare, a new escort Mkiii .... smoking !! lol .... Don't worry it's Armageddon out there, there are no fags left.
The Amis quote above strikes a chord... I was thinking of the couple behind the doors against the wall and him "caring" for his wife... it crossed my mind he should have topped her off??
Looking forward (weird) to watching the rest tonight.
then taped the rest to finish tonight.
Who are you, who are all these people in the thread (no pun intended) that tape TV shows?!!
😉
Looking forward to watching this (I think). I would have been 9 when it came out but I never saw it then and only learned about it many years later. Though I do remember going to see when the wind blows at the cinema.
Growing up in a basement flat in London I used to lie in bed wondering if the shockwave would go right over the top of us, while also hoping the cat wouldn't be in the garden when it happened. What a time to be a kid! 🙂
Like many above it had a traumatic effect on my as a 20 year old. Put less subtlety it scared the crap out of me!!
I suspect it will have dated somewhat in the intervening years. However that could work both ways. Could make it even more chilling.
Definitely one of the most important scary iconic memorable frightening upsetting (I could go on) bits of TV I’ve ever seen.
Who are you, who are all these people in the thread (no pun intended) that tape TV shows?!!
I'm sure it's just an expression for using a hard drive or whatever.
Still don't see the point I haven't had an aerial or sat dish connection for a few years now.
Just looking at a Furguson Videostar gives me flashbacks to the explosive pop-up when ejecting a tape.
I suspect it will have dated somewhat in the intervening years
I watched it for the first time last night and it didn't feel dated at all. They obviously had a very limited budget, so there are no dramatic wide shots and special effects. Everything is really tight and claustrophobic, but that, along with the 1980s TV quality video suits the documentary style of the film perfectly. The fact it leans more towards that documentary style rather than drama makes it more chilling, because you don't feel the normal safe distance of watching a fictional story being told. I think it is a masterpiece of writing and direction.
Absolute silence after the first few minutes until the finish (including my 14 year old). Apart from my wife, who indignantly pointed out during the final scene that a character born post apocalypse had fillings...
Absolute silence after the first few minutes until the finish (including my 14 year old)
That's interesting, I thought the relative lack of pace and background music would've had contemporary kids reaching for their phones in minutes.
Try him on this late 70s episode of a programme about the survivors of a global pandemic:
Absolutely sh£t me up as a 10 year old (you thought 80s parenting was hands off...) and I think it still stands up.
Just watching it now. Pretty grim.
I know things aren't currently nuclear, but I can't help feel for the poor buggers around the world getting bombed with 'conventional' weapons. Not something I'm sure nearly all of us can even comprehend living with.
Watched it last night. Its my first time seeing it.
Bloody
Hell
People telling you how unremittingly grim it is, doesn't really prepare you for how unremittingly grim it is.
Christ the ending...
I'm off to build a bunker in the garage. I'll be stocking it with enough Tramadol that everyone can go nighty night as we inevitably succumb to either radiation sickness, crippling illness or starvation.
But what happen when the bomb drops
Down
Watched it until the mushroom clouds last night. That was fifty minutes or so. Tense. "Why didn't you unplug the bloody aerial?!" Would that have helped? Guessing not.
Will watch the rest at the weekend.
I know things aren’t currently nuclear,
We aren't that far away worryingly, and the timeline of the film was a matter of weeks before conventional diplomacy turned into nuclear willy waving contest.
Definitely one of the most important scary iconic memorable frightening upsetting (I could go on) bits of TV I’ve ever seen.
You probably want to look out for Children of the Stones HTV 1976 that was pretty bad considering it was for kids 🙂
This is in a similar vein. Possibly even grimmer as it focuses on an entire country
Bit of light bed time reading
I thought it was a documentary about everyday life in Sheffield.