The Regrifter: 04/01/2014

Stars: Jason Robards, JoBeth Williams, Steve Guttenberg

What IMDB sez: "A graphic, disturbing film about the effects of a devastating nuclear holocaust on small-town residents of eastern Kansas."

What WE say: The Day After, aka, the movie that prevented World War 3. No, really. According to legend, after Regan watched The Day After... well let's let Wikipedia tell that story:

"President Ronald Reagan watched the film several days before its screening, on November 5, 1983.^[6] He wrote in his diary that the film was "very effective and left me greatly depressed,"^[6] and that it changed his mind on the prevailing policy on a "nuclear war".^[7] The film was also screened for the Joint Chiefs of Staff. A government advisor who attended the screening, a friend of Meyer's, told him "If you wanted to draw blood, you did it. Those guys sat there like they were turned to stone."^[6] Four years later, the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty was signed and in Reagan's memoirs he drew a direct line from the film to the signing.^[6] Reagan later sent Meyer a telegram after the summit, saying, "Don't think your movie didn't have any part of this, because it did."^[3] In a 2010 interview, Meyer said that this was a myth, and that the sentiment stemmed from a friend's letter to Meyer; he suggested the story had origins in editing notes received from the White House during the production, which "...may have been a joke, but it wouldn't surprise me, him being an old Hollywood guy."^[6]
The film also had impact outside the U.S. In 1987, during the era of Mikhail Gorbachev's glasnost and perestroika reforms, the film was shown on Soviet television. Four years earlier, Georgia Rep. Elliott Levitas and 91 co-sponsors introduced a resolution in the U.S. House of Representatives "[expressing] the sense of the Congress that the American Broadcasting Company, the Department of State, and the U.S. Information Agency should work to have the television movie The Day After aired to the Soviet public."^[8]"

What IMDB sez: Disturbing collection of 1940s and 1950s United States government issued propaganda films designed to reassure Americans that the atomic bomb was not a threat to their safety.

What WE say: You kids today with your smart bombs and iPongs and such, you kids gots it easy, I tells ya! Easy! Y'see back in my pappy's day they had this shit, right there. Every second of the Atomic Cafe, my folks lived that shit, for reals, yo. By the time us Gen Xers rolled around the idea of a nuclear holocaust was just a given. "Only a matter of time, kids. Best to try and not think about it and just dream about, um, wars... in the stars... or something. Hope the bombs don't fall while you sleep, night love!" Fun times. Still, it's a wee bit more relaxing than some (re: all) of the other picks on this nuclear eve special! Enjoy your iPongs you little shits and feast on this bit of madness!