2/3 The Day After | 1983 Nuclear War Movie

A 30-minute rework of the 1983 nuclear war film The Day After focused on the documentary aspect of the movie.

The Day After is an American-made-for-TV movie first broadcast on the ABC television network in 1983. More than 100 million people, in nearly 39 million households, watched the initial broadcast. The film hugely impacted US audiences and aired on Soviet state TV in 1987. The Day After is often credited with helping to usher in a period of nuclear arms reduction treaties in the late 1980s and was ranked the highest-rated television film until 2009.

The Day After depicts a scenario of rising tensions along the East-West border of a divided Germany during the latter phase of the Cold War. Relations between NATO and Russia rapidly deteriorate as events spiral out of control leading to armed conflict and nuclear war. The film focuses on Lawrence, Kansas, and Kansas City, Missouri where several family farms sit close to nuclear missile silos. The Day After documents the actual state of nuclear readiness maintained by the US and Russia. Both nations maintain a nuclear triad in constant readiness for thermonuclear war.

The Day After was first conceived by ABC Motion Picture Division president Brandon Stoddard who came up with the idea after watching The China Syndrome. Veteran television writer Edward Hume undertook a massive amount of research on the likely effects of nuclear war and went to work on a script in 1981. Due to the graphic content of the subject matter, however, several drafts were rejected by the network until the characters and plot finally seemed acceptable for a family audience. Most of the actors in The Day After were Kansas City residents recruited from local shopping malls.

Director Nicholas Meyer had just completed Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan and wanted to create a film that accurately portrayed the consequences of nuclear war. After wrangling with the US Department of Defence and the ABC censors, Meyer released a compromise version of The Day After for primetime TV screens. According to the message at the end of the film:

‘The catastrophic events you have just witnessed are, in all likelihood, less severe than the destruction that would occur in the event of a full-scale nuclear strike against the United States.
It is hoped that the images of this film will inspire the nations of this earth, their peoples and leaders, to find the means to avert the fateful day.’

The Day After: https://amzn.to/3jGzX3H
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