There is a ton of movies about nuclear war that are actually haunting. Barefoot Gen, for example. Some of these war movies are actually really frightening and I had nightmares from them. When it comes to British production, Threads comes to mind.This movie is very different and not in a good way. The elderly couple talks and talks and talks and the only horror I have experienced is the fright that they just won't ever stop. Really. Seriously. After one hour of uninterrupted chatter I just wished the movie would end already.The movie plays strongly at the 'good ol' England" instrument but it is downright silly. The nice elderly gentleman tries to comply with information from the government leaflets even though they are obviously stupid. The elderly woman just behaves as a housewife and cares not a bit about the world or about anyone else. Both of them pretend nothing serious at all is actually happening.First and foremost: As a generation that has experienced 1945 and bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki they should know better. There was never ending flow of civil defense trainings and information at that era. Everyone was informed way way better about what to do in the case of nuclear attack. The approach of the old folks to the situation is not just silly, it is simply retarded. Both of them should have been in the nursing home already.Second: There is not a sign of any emotional reaction from these silly folks. It might be because of some British sort of parody, but really: Everyone in such situation experiences horrible stress. Take a look at the "The Day After" - everyone is shaken into the core and on the brink of nervous breakup. For these retarded folks it is just some form of inconvenience. They are cleaning the house as if they just had experienced some sort of wild house party. Do they care about their folks in London? Do they care at all about their neighbors, about their friends? No, let's have a cup of tea, dear! Do you want some ketchup with your sausage, dear? They are not humans. They are some sort of constantly mumbling self centered and almost completely ignorant aliens. This movie should NOT be shown to the children as a warning from the horrors of the nuclear war. They would be bored into the death as after visit of a nursing home. Grandpa Simpson had a couple of both more thrilling and more horrible stories about the war! Watch the Barefoot Gen, watch the Threads, watch The Day After and then compare it with this movie. You may discover the high average evaluation of this movie is just as silly as the elderly couple.

When the Wind Blows is one of those films that keeps on haunting you long after the end credits have stopped rolling.It focuses on an elderly couple preparing for and enduring a nuclear attack on great Britain. Both are endearing in their love for each other, and their naive trust that all will be well if they prepare well. Sadly for them, none of the precautions they take protect them from nuclear fall-out. The point of the couple being naive was to emphasize how ludicrous and futile the advise the government offered to its citizens on how to react to a nuclear blast was. The movie rips all the advise given in the brochures and public information films to shreds by showing a couple who did their best to follow all the prescriptions to the letter, and proving that none of the advise they were given is of any use to them.The writer cleverly chose as his main characters an elderly couple who have survived WW2. It gives him the opportunity to hammer home to the audience that a nuclear war is not going to be even remotely comparable to the hardships of WW2. A lot of people used to say to each other that a nuclear war wouldn't be so bad as the doom-sayers predicted. After all we already survived 2 world wars. Sure many people would die, but most would survive and carry on regardless. Apart from the obvious political messages the movie has, its just a heartbreaking tale about a couple coping with the aftermath of a disaster. Although they bicker like old couples do, it's their love for each other that gets them through the day. They seem like a good team. He's more aware of the reality of the world outside, she's a practical thinker. When he sometimes gets a bit carried away with his memories of world war 2, she gently corrects him. When she panics, or worries about unimportant things like getting the laundry inside before the bomb falls, he protects her by preventing her from doing anything stupid. In the end their love is as strong as ever, which is very moving.This movie in part was intended to give people who were too complacent a wake-up call. I remember seeing it when I was only thirteen thinking I was in for a nice animation film. It shook me up alright. Now I'm older, I see the subtler points of the movie, and it still gives me chills.The opening sequence of the film consisting of news footage doesn't fit in very well with the rest, which is a pity. Personally I would have chosen to let the movie start with the man reading the papers in the library. Other than that, I think the movie made very few mistakes, and the animation styles changing over from sketchy and dreamy sequences, conventional drawn animations, and stop motion techniques work together nicely. As it is it stands out as a great achievement in serious animated movie-history.

Based on the graphic novel of the same name by Raymond Briggs, a retired World War II British veteran, Jim Bloggs, and his wife, Hilda, learns about the war between America and the Soviet Union could involved nuclear weapons. Jim begins building a fallout shelter based on the designed from the booklets they received from the government. It was a good thing it was done because days later a nuclear warhead from the Soviet Union was heading their way. Jim gets Hilda to the shelter and survives the blast, but they don't realize… the blast was the least of their problems. After two days, based of the booklets, Jim and Hilda go outside for some fresh air and water.The nuclear weapon had covered their rural area in radiation fallout and the couple gets exposed to heavy amounts of it. As time goes by, they start to suffer from radiation sickness, especially Hilda when she starts to lose her hair. The chances of survival start to fade away, and they are in a stage of confusing in their dying moments. The film ends bleakly for them, as they go into the shelter to pray. Although not seen, it's likely they succumb and pass away from compilations of radiation sickness. The final words from them fade into the night sky, uncertain what will become of them.

If there's one movie on my list of favourite animated films, this is what I'd pick. A fantastic animated flick starring none other than Sir John Mills and Dame Peggy Ashcroft that deals with with the threat of a nuclear holocaust. It's like this, Jim Bloggs goes home on a bus to his wife and prepare a scrumptious British meal of sausages and chips, but that's not so peaceful after it turns out nuclear war is about to break out (in the film, I mean) in two or three days time. Jim jumps up in shock and exclaims "Crumbs! This is it, ducks." and over the next couple of days gets the work for a fallout shelter done, well not necessarily done, but what they think is done. Of course, they rely on "Protect and Survive", which I'm not entirely sure was completely reliable in the Cold War, and presume that just because a rescue brigade took care of citizens in the second World War, it will be the same for this one. Then it happens! The missile comes and totally destroys the countryside, blinding car drivers and blowing buildings apart. But that's not the worst part, instead it's when Jim and Hilda decide to go outside in attempts to harvest and keep popping out of their shelter so often, that they develop radiation sickness. So, I first watched the film on the internet when I was 13, now I'm 14, and soon I definitely wish to buy the original VHS on eBay or Amazon so my classmates can see it. BTW, the nuclear attack scene really gave me the shivers first time I saw it.