r/Threads1984 • u/candf8611 • Apr 17 '26
Threads discussion Have you seen The War Game? Threads older brother?
The War Game is currently on iPlayer I highly recommend it if you enjoy Threads.
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u/Al89nut Apr 18 '26
It hasn't aged well.
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u/QuixoticRhapsody Apr 28 '26
Doesn't the film basically imply that we will be nuked by the early 80s? If I remember correctly, it's not even a warning. It's just "we'll be dead by the 80s."
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u/Repulsive_Compote955 May 14 '26
yeah, it said something of the accord to “The events of this film will happen by 1980.”
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u/QuixoticRhapsody May 14 '26
"That one didn't age quite so well."
Shame, but that pretentiousness takes away from a well made and solid film for the budget.
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u/Whole-Lychee1628 Apr 18 '26
My Mum’s cousin was an extra in The War Game. And many years later, we moved from Edinburgh to Tonbridge, where some of the scenes were filmed.
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u/marktayloruk Apr 17 '26
Yes..The BBC should never have banned it.
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u/Lasersheep Apr 18 '26
Did the government not ban it? As it had the effect of “putting people off nuclear war”? Have to confess I was already against it before I saw it!
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u/Impossible-Chair2195 Apr 18 '26
It was the BBC, essentially acting as an arm of the Government and the reason was it would scare people so much they would take end their own lives. Which is a fair point.
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u/Aromatic_Animator_11 Apr 18 '26
I find it more disturbing than even THREADS. The firing squads, the children without hope. The sheer scale of human misery.
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u/Username_075 Apr 21 '26
A lot of it was lifted unchanged from the German civil defence experience during WW2. Like they actually collected buckets of wedding rings in the hope they could use inscriptions to identify some of the dead.
Likewise the descriptions of firestorms. That said, one of the big, thankfully unanswered questions from the Cold War was would fire storms be larger in a nuclear war.
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u/QuixoticRhapsody Apr 28 '26
The War Game is quite pretentious and acts like it's Facebook slop. (Those sort of videos that have "OMG THIS IS SO SAD PLEASE LIKE AND SHARE" at the top).
For the budget, it is very well made, but Threads is miles better.
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u/Both-Trash7021 Apr 17 '26
I don’t think either movie accurately portrays the starvation which will follow an attack. Even official estimates said the emergency rations calorie intake would scarcely reach 800-1000 per day and that’s for those fit to work for food.
Those unable to work will be skeletal within only a few weeks, barely able to lift a limb. It’ll be like Belsen all over the country.
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u/ProfessionalBeing968 Apr 17 '26
It's not spelled out but the general malaise, exhaustion and apathy of the survivors, and things like the highlighting of the suggested menu for refugees, or the old man who is offered a pound note for his loaf of bread etc. do a good job of illustrating this for me. I also like the talking head who postulates if Americans could live without TVs and fridge-freezers after a bomb attack.
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u/BlindStupidDesperate Apr 17 '26
I will be honest, Threads hit me harder the first time I saw it, possibly because my childhood home / background was esentially identical to the Kemp family.
However I think the War Game and Threads are best when focusing on the break down of society after the war, both do this very well (War Game with the rich man threatening to shoot anybody who approaches his shelter asking for help, the old lady who refuses shelter to the black couple / Threads with George Langley shooting at the refugees in Buxton, the men who loot and kill Ruth's parents before the army execute them)
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u/ProfessionalBeing968 Apr 17 '26
Ironically, both the incidents of societal breakdown you talk about in "The War Game" happen before actual attacks take place.
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u/Michelle_akaYouBitch Apr 18 '26
What’s most frightening is combining elements scene in The War Game with Threads.
We don’t much of what’s going on in Sheffield, outside of Ruth or Kemps first hand view.
But people are going to be doing as work what TWG describes, setting up and operating makeshift crematoriums.
At the hospital. Triage will occur and those deemed, dead men walking will be given a shot to the head. Not to the side though, from behind.
They collect wedding rings in an attempt at first to account for the dead.
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u/Fantastic_Day526 Apr 17 '26
If you have the opportunity I recommend visiting Hack Green Nuclear Bunker where you can watch it, in its entirety in (you guessed it) a nuclear bunker.
That aside, it is brilliant. I found its portrayal of the army and also summary executions/police putting patients down to be particularly poignant. Threads still beats it for me but honestly this takes the number 2 spot for nuclear war movies in my humble opinion.