The doomers guide to movies.

Kentucky Fried Panda · Post by **Kentucky Fried Panda** » 18 Aug 2007, 20:26

I don't have many films that don't have people dying in them...

My fave least violent films are:

The World's fastest Indian
The motorcycle Diaries
Sideways
Chasing Amy

Mind you I ebayed and carbooted a load of DVDs recently. Once I've seen a film 2-3 times I can't be bothered watching it again. So I no longer collect films unless they're truly exceptional.

Keela · Post by **Keela** » 19 Aug 2007, 06:58

Oh yes! My father lent us a video of The World's Fastest Indian.
It's a really good film.

Keela · Post by **Keela** » 19 Aug 2007, 07:02

Haggis wrote: Once I've seen a film 2-3 times I can't be bothered watching it again.

You watch films more than once? I think Life of Brian and Local Hero are the only 2 I've seen more than once.

Oh and perhaps some of those ones the Beeb used to play at Christmas every year. Ummm okay and Dumbo and other of the Disney ones that the kids used to comfort watch....

Tracy P · Post by **Tracy P** » 19 Aug 2007, 08:32

Now, these films are more like it! Yes, Mobbsey, Happiness!
I don't mind the badies dying btw!
I like Life of Brian very much, Matrix, The Game, Die Hard, etc. Wallace and Gromit, Ice Age! Shrek.......
The doom movies are interesting now and again, but I find too many in a row very depressing! I think empathise too much and am a softy!

tattercoats · Post by **tattercoats** » 19 Aug 2007, 10:23

I split my scant watching time between current affairs, classic serials, old favourites like T2 and Die Hard, and doomer stuff like Supervolcano and The Day After Tomorrow - two DVDs I watch every so often for comfort. I love disaster movies.

In a bizarre way, seeing events played out on the screen makes me (a) thankful for how safe we still are, (b) more determined to safeguard my family as well as possible, and (c) take a step back and see thigns on a species-wide scale, which makes me worry less about the immediate future.

My son watches these with me, but my DH doesn't - too worrying for him.

Post by **mikepepler** » 19 Aug 2007, 20:11

tattercoats wrote:I split my scant watching time between...

No TV means we have plenty of time for watching films, without them taking up too much of our waking lives

SherryMayo · Post by **SherryMayo** » 20 Aug 2007, 12:08

Doomer movies I've watched of late (both on DVD) are
28 days later (I think the eye-gouging scene will stay with me forever ... yeeuch!)
Children of Men - which I think is one of the best movies I've seen in quite a while, mainly because of the way it took trends from the present days and kind of extrapolated them - it seemed so believable.

One thing that gave both of these movies an 'edge' for me was seeing horrible things happening in a familiar setting (eg the UK). Movies set in the US don't seem as 'real' somehow.

I grew up during the last part of the cold war in an area if the UK with quite a few US bases - eg prime targets in the event of a nuclear exchange. I think this has left me with a taste for 'doomer' fiction and movies and there were a lot of them being made when I was a teen in the early 80s. Things I still remember include:

Edge of Darkness
Old men at the Zoo
Day of the Triffids
Threads
I think I very dimly remember Survivors too

Like Tattercoats, I find such things strangely escapist or soothing in some weird way (though Threads scared the crap out of me as a youngster!:shock: ).

Since the fall of the Berlin wall and the "end" of the Cold War everyone seems to have forgtten about the worlds nuclear arsenals that still bristle with missiles. With Russia getting expanding its military might, and rattling sabres everywhere including the Arctic, a new Cold War might not be so far off. Lets look on the bright side - there may be a new crop of great new Doomer movies and TV series!

Andy Hunt · Post by **Andy Hunt** » 20 Aug 2007, 12:26

"28 Days Later" is a classic 'doomer' film - I bet the scenario is a lot more realistic than most people realise.

I love "Silent Running", the 1970's hippy sci-fi classic about the last forests orbiting Saturn. I can watch that one again and again.

As for non-'doomer' films - how about "A Fish Called Wanda"?

SherryMayo · Post by **SherryMayo** » 20 Aug 2007, 13:19

Andy Hunt wrote:"28 Days Later" is a classic 'doomer' film - I bet the scenario is a lot more realistic than most people realise.

Danny Boyle made another movie recently "Sunshine" which is a somewhat Doomerish space opera. I enjoyed seeing that one on the big screen (it tanked at the Box ofice though!).

Andy Hunt wrote:I love "Silent Running", the 1970's hippy sci-fi classic about the last forests orbiting Saturn. I can watch that one again and again.

I also loved Silent Running, and I'd like to add a vote for Dark Star which would probably qualify in both the doomer AND comedy departments (perhaps one to please the Pepler household

).

Andy Hunt · Post by **Andy Hunt** » 20 Aug 2007, 13:24

Dark Star is an absolute classic!!

Watch out for the scary 'beach ball' alien . . .

Pippa · Post by **Pippa** » 21 Aug 2007, 08:49

These days I enjoy anything with Tom Hanks in it, as a kid I loved John Wayne films.

Kentucky Fried Panda · Post by **Kentucky Fried Panda** » 21 Aug 2007, 18:17

I watched "The Shooter" with Mark Wahlberg last night. I wish they'd put the deleted scenes in, they're in the DVD extras.
In quite a few they talk about oil conspiracies and resource conflicts. The main reason for the plot is oil, but they could have made a better film by leaving in some of the longer pieces of dialogue. Probably edited for a main stream audiences short attention span.

Adam1 · Post by **Adam1** » 21 Aug 2007, 23:15

Time of the Wolf is the bleakest, most depressing representation of a dystopian future - definitely a 10 on the doomer scale. One to avoid, unless you are feeling ridiculously upbeat.

Survivors is my favourite. I was 12 when it was first shown and it stuck in my memory over the years until the DVD came out a few years ago.

Children of Nature (B?rn n?tt?runnar), 1991 - not doomerish, but my favourite film of the moment. Two reluctant residents of a Reykjavik old people's home escape to return to the now abandoned peninsular of Hornstrandir , the most northerly of Iceland's western fjords. The hard life and world view of most Icelanders, who lived on the land BFF (before fossil fuel), is contrasted with today's predominantly city-based population, most of whom are as dependent on fossil fuels as the rest of us and who eschew the agrarian past of their parents and grandparents.

SherryMayo · Post by **SherryMayo** » 21 Aug 2007, 23:40

Pippa wrote:These days I enjoy anything with Tom Hanks in it, as a kid I loved John Wayne films.

It was a Tom Hanks film (Apollo 13) that inspired me to buy a slide rule - the ultimate in low energy computing. Those engineers sliding away calculating entry trajectories was just too cool (well at least to me - I am a bit of a geek).

You can still buy vintage slide rules of the type used on the Apollo program wih the "Apollo" promotional logo on them.

Mean Mr Mustard · Post by **Mean Mr Mustard** » 22 Aug 2007, 07:36

Seeing as we're talking Tom Hanks, The Money Pit is one of my favourites. Property Doom!