The Day After (1983)

Set in a small town in Kansas, the townspeople nervously await while Cold War tensions escalate between the Soviet Union and the U.S. and the possibility of nuclear war suddenly becomes very real. Directed by Nicholas Meyer (THE SEVEN PER CENT SOLUTION), this telefilm (which was also released theatrically in Europe with five additional minutes) was an event movie and became the highest rated TV movie of all time, a title it holds to this day. It still holds up (North Korea now having taken the place of the Soviet Union) and retains its power. But the flaws it had when first aired still remain. To put it bluntly, the characters are trite (yes, there's even a woman about to give birth during all this) as is much of their dialog. One can't invest much care into their fate. TESTAMENT which also came out the same year solved the problem by focusing exclusively on one family rather than a group of disparate characters. What THE DAY AFTER does accomplish is showing their growing fear of what may/will happen, the hysteria and fear and of course, the unspeakable aftermath. The quality of the acting is all over the place. The score by David Raksin incorporates Virgil Thomson's THE RIVER. With Jason Robards, Jobeth Williams, John Lithgow, Amy Madigan, Steve Guttenberg, John Cullum, Bibi Besch, Arliss Howard, Georgann Johnson and Jeff East.