When I say that this is unbelievable I mean that it is beyond belief how amazingly shocking this realistic and humane portrayal of the end of the earth is. This has to be one of the most powerful films ever made. Incredible emotional depiction of what could be. The only downside is that it is in America and only shows that side, it's overly patriotic and portrays America as the good guys. They were in the wrong just like everyone else. This amazing and powerful film is the most dramatic film that I have seen to date. Well worth watching but not for those looking for brain fodder. This is emotional and this is real. You will be thinking about your life and yourself when this film ends. I just hope that I never have to experience this for real.

This was so hyped in its day (1983, 34 years ago). We're still under the threat of a nuclear holocaust with more fingers on the trigger. Unfortunately a couple of those are relatively unstable figures. I remember the lead up to this film and all the talk that went on. When it ended, we were told to look around at the beauty of the world and life itself and to be grateful for this to not have actually happened. The missile silos in Kansas (and obviously other parts of America) are opened and weapons launched. Someone, probably the Soviets and employed first strike. That leads to speculation as to what would happen in the aftermath. I remember the scene in the grocery store where the teenage checkout guy is moving at triple time. The falling ash and the dropping temperatures of a nuclear winter. People trying to help the survivors when food and water are contaminated. It barely addresses the horrors of radiation sickness and dismemberment. This had quite an impact on America for a while. But we've gone back to thinking that if it's dropped on someone else, it will be OK.

This along with Testament (1983) and Threads (1984) form the trilogy of (anti-)nuclear war movies that scared a generation in the height of the Cold War that greeted the world following the election of Reagan in 1980 to the White House. Kind of you made you feel nostalgic for the era of malaise under the Carter Administration.One scene that haunted me in The Day After was the wedding scene, where at the same time of the nuclear explosion in the USA, the bride and groom kissed at the ceremony, their first and last act as newlyweds.When this was screened on ABC, it pre-empted an episode of Hardcastle and McCormick, and one of the movie's actors John "Northern Exposure" Cullum, had to give an intro warning for little kids. It was a scary movie even for adults.

30-odd years on this is still an immensely powerful and thought-provoking film. As one reviewer put it: "one of the most horrific non-horror films ever made". I couldn't agree more. Yes, it's crudely made (by today's standards), it's "only" a television film and it's heavily flawed in various aspects (which have already been covered), but it has never really lost its relevance. In fact, in light of the current political situation in eastern Europe it has gained renewed relevance, since we currently find ourselves in essence in exactly the same sort of conflict portrayed in the film. Has it actually ever really gone away?The Day After is one of those films that has largely been forgotten. Perhaps because people nowadays don't consider nuclear warfare a threat anymore or because it wasn't a typical Hollywood blockbuster. I don't know anybody who's watched it in the last 20-25 years and I've never heard anybody mention it in that same period of time. It's an enormously underrated film that portrays the horror of nuclear warfare and its consequences in a very realistic way, despite having been made in the early 80's; its bleak atmosphere only emphasising this.I have my doubts as to whether the outcome of the current eastern European crisis will be the same as in the film, since the people in charge are much more aware now of the consequences of nuclear warfare, but everybody would benefit from watching this film (again), especially since the nuclear weapons haven't altogether disappeared since then - they are still very real. America and Russia (and their allies) still have enough nuclear weapons to destroy the entire world ten times over, and some would argue that there is no point in having nuclear weapons if you didn't intend to use them ... at some point.Perhaps we should all reacquaint ourselves with the horrors of nuclear warfare (and watching this film would be a small step in the right direction) in the hope that it will make it less likely that anybody will ever even think about using nuclear weapons ever again.