Panic In Year Zero
1962, USA
dir. Ray Milland
Cast:Ray Milland,
Frankie Avalon, Jean Hagen
The Baldwin family
head off on a camping trip and from the hills, witness the
destruction of Los Angeles by nuclear attack. As the roads get
swamped by refugees, father Harry realises that it's everyone for
themselves, so stocks up on food, robs a gun store and holes his
family up in a cave. When his son is injured in a gun fight with some
hooligans who raped their daughter, the family have to return to
what's left of civilisation, finding the army restoring order.
One
of the first films to consider the question of post-nuclear survival
(even if issues like fallout are skirted round), Panic In Year Zero
probably inspired a whole generation of survivalists to stock up
their retreats. It'll teach you to only grab tinned and dried food,
to cache food in case of robbery and to shoot any rapey looking
greasers at the first opportunity you get, before they come back and
take advantage of your womenfolk. The thread of decent folk having to
do desperate things to survive is a thread that continued through
films like No Blade Of Grass and
Carriers. Although
now dated, the film is still interesting as a document of the
times. The film ends with them meeting some soldiers,
with the presence of the army being a sign of hope, where as post
Vietnam/Watergate, the presence of the army in most films would mean
you'd at best be shot accidentally, if not robbed or worse (see most
of Romero's Dead films). A remnant of a time about to lose its
innocence.
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