Threads

A most depressive film. Unfortunately, Threads is a lot more documentary (descriptive) than film proper (narrative), I would much rather see the same situation told in a normal way, it could be a fantastic. This way it’s only a brilliant statement that everyone should see. I really hope that I will never have the chance to compare this vision with reality. (08/30/2009)

I understand why I spent four years looking for it, and why I waited another year to watch it, thinking I had to be in the right mood. That didn’t work. In fact, it can't. What is depicted is not suggestiveness, but rather spews depression and hopelessness in a massive geyser. Reality can't be imagined any worse than this... and then comes reality itself. (11/13/2010)

"In these early stages the symptoms of radiation sickness and the symptoms of panic are identical." Disconcertingly powerful. Even from today’s point of view. I don’t even want to imagine the reaction it provoked when it was made. When I was watching it, it assumed that Robert Merle must have collaborated on the screenplay. The topic, the way it was made using documentary excerpts, the characters and the message all sound like they come from his pen. Together with following the fates of two ordinary families from Sheffield, the documentary clips form a “before, during and after" apocalyptic saga. And what about this being a TV movie? That is it’s greatest plus, because it’s that TV minimalism that gives it an absolutely exceptional stamp of reality. Let alone the ingenious use of silence that speaks volumes. This all applies until Ruth sets off into the desolation to look for Jimmy. This scene contains absolutely everything possible, and in its wake the last half hour simply states the obvious and then too rushed for all the events going on. That unfortunately spoils the otherwise phenomenal impression gained before. (01/27/2008)

It's not the end of the world, is it? You’ll hear this lying reassurance here too. Raw, realistic, crushing and dryly presented. Stark sentences sometimes say more than a thousand images. Silence is louder than shouting. (09/28/2011)

Many will say that Threads is amateur garbage, they couldn’t be further from the truth. The combination of naturalistic images, documentary elements, complex structure and deliberate emotional detachment results in a valuable masterpiece that is painful to watch, but at the same time impossible to look away from. The film is neutral about the dreaded issue and uses the characters as tools to manipulate the viewer, as a point of contact in the recapitulation of "real events". The plot is nothing but a pretext for a statement, which itself is a means of formal self-awareness (commentary and subtitles with data and statistics) and to generate a response from the viewer through everyday realistic motivations (the introductory information about the escalating conflict through TV news and radio). With the enemy and the possibility of salvation remaining absent and the afflicted humanity and the devastated environment coming to the fore, it is also a piece of work that is both timeless and current. And the sequence of the nuclear attack is very smartly and effectively staged, it will make your blood clot. (09/25/2019)

Threads succeeds in doing what it was made to do. To shock. It is not just due to lack of funding that they show us the impact of nuclear potential in burning faces, dying animals, and the lifeless bodies of babies. Well, why not? The most interesting part of the film is the years-long aftermath, showing the remnants of humanity thrown into the Middle Ages (details like the stunting of the tongue are appealing) trying to recover from the aftermath of the disaster, plus the absolutely incredible ending of the film (a wonderful counterpoint to the cyclical big movies where the final birth of a descendant always brings hope and promise, see Fanny and Alexander, for example). Okay, but I’d rather know if the filmmakers were so naive that they still believed in the classic "hey mister president, take a little walk with me", with the main characters not realizing the consequences of their actions until the end. Which of course they were aware of, they didn't have time for movies anyway, and thus the only purpose of Threads at the time it was created was to inadvertently spread panic and stress among the people, and which thanks to filmmaking techniques that always work (mother and child, child and child, child and dog, etc.) they can only watch desperately as the nuclear clock ticks. (05/28/2011)

It's a shame the filmmakers didn't decide to actually make the entire thing like a documentary, to make it more authentic, or to have better acting. Then, it probably would have been a really unique piece of work, but as it was I felt like something was missing. However, it also has to be admitted that it still has a very strong narrative capacity and is very well thought out. (03/21/2018)