Duck and Cover
by A_F_Waddell | created - 24 Dec 2015 | updated - 12 Mar 2016 | PublicFilms Well-Known and Obscure: Things Nuclear
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1. Amazing Grace and Chuck (1987)
PG | 114 min | Drama, Sport
A little league player named Chuck refuses to ever pitch again until nuclear weapons are disarmed. Basketball star "Amazing Grace" Smith follows the boy's example, and starts a trend.
Director: Mike Newell | Stars: Jamie Lee Curtis, Gregory Peck, Dean Alexander, Jim Allen
Votes: 1,530
2. By Dawn's Early Light (1990 TV Movie)
PG-13 | 100 min | Action, Drama, Thriller
A non-NATO nuclear missile is fired from Turkey at USSR, where it detonates. Soviet response is automatic as it's seen as a NATO missile. Can continued escalation be avoided? We follow the US president and a bomber crew.
Director: Jack Sholder | Stars: Powers Boothe, Rebecca De Mornay, James Earl Jones, Martin Landau
Votes: 4,091
3. Countdown to Looking Glass (1984 TV Movie)
90 min | Drama
Dramatic doomsday scenario in which the Cold War fully escalates. The story is told through a live news report that follows the apocalyptic world-ending nuclear exchange between the U.S.A. and the U.S.S.R.
Director: Fred Barzyk | Stars: Scott Glenn, Michael Murphy, Helen Shaver, Patrick Watson
Votes: 714
4. Crimson Tide (1995)
R | 116 min | Action, Drama, Thriller
On a U.S. nuclear missile sub, a young First Officer stages a mutiny to prevent his trigger happy Captain from launching his missiles before confirming his orders to do so.
Director: Tony Scott | Stars: Gene Hackman, Denzel Washington, Matt Craven, George Dzundza
Votes: 123,264 | Gross: $91.40M
5. Day One (1989 TV Movie)
Not Rated | 141 min | Drama, History
The use of the atomic bomb to end WWII was one of the most controversial events in human history. This Emmy-winning 1989 miniseries brings the conflicts to life in wrenching performances by a stellar cast.
Director: Joseph Sargent | Stars: Brian Dennehy, David Strathairn, Michael Tucker, Hume Cronyn
Votes: 506
6. Dirty War (2004 TV Movie)
TV-MA | 90 min | Thriller, Drama
A terrorist group detonates a radiological dispersal device (RDD) in Central London. Due to a lack of preparation, training, and resources, chaos ensues.
Director: Daniel Percival | Stars: Gavin Abbott, Joanne Adams, Shamshad Akhtar, Dean Ashton
Votes: 1,619
7. Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)
PG | 95 min | Comedy, War
An unhinged American general orders a bombing attack on the Soviet Union, triggering a path to nuclear holocaust that a war room full of politicians and generals frantically tries to stop.
Director: Stanley Kubrick | Stars: Peter Sellers, George C. Scott, Sterling Hayden, Keenan Wynn
Votes: 517,996 | Gross: $0.28M
8. Fail Safe (1964)
Approved | 112 min | Drama, Thriller
A technical malfunction sends American planes to Moscow to deliver a nuclear attack. Can all-out war be averted?
Director: Sidney Lumet | Stars: Henry Fonda, Walter Matthau, Fritz Weaver, Dan O'Herlihy
Votes: 24,400
9. Fat Man and Little Boy (1989)
PG-13 | 127 min | Biography, Drama, History
This film reenacts the Manhattan Project, the secret WWII project, and the first atomic bombs designed, built, and tested in Los Alamos.
Director: Roland Joffé | Stars: Paul Newman, Dwight Schultz, Bonnie Bedelia, John Cusack
Votes: 9,120 | Gross: $3.56M
10. Ladybug Ladybug (1963)
Not Rated | 82 min | Drama
Staff and students at a rural school react to a warning of an imminent nuclear attack, not knowing whether it is real or a mistake.
Director: Frank Perry | Stars: Jane Connell, William Daniels, James Frawley, Richard Hamilton
Votes: 962
11. Miracle Mile (1988)
R | 87 min | Action, Drama, Romance
A young man hears a chance phone call telling him that a nuclear war has started and missiles will hit his city in 70 minutes.
Director: Steve De Jarnatt | Stars: Anthony Edwards, Mare Winningham, John Agar, Lou Hancock
Votes: 12,341 | Gross: $1.15M
12. Nightbreaker (1989 TV Movie)
Unrated | 99 min | Drama
Dr. Brown thinks back on his 30+ years working as an Army shrink in Nevada in 1956, when U.S. soldiers were exposed to A-bomb radiation.
Director: Peter Markle | Stars: Martin Sheen, Emilio Estevez, Lea Thompson, Melinda Dillon
Votes: 501
13. On the Beach (1959)
Approved | 134 min | Drama, Romance, Sci-Fi
After a global nuclear war, the residents of Australia must come to terms with the fact that all life will be destroyed in a matter of months.
Director: Stanley Kramer | Stars: Gregory Peck, Ava Gardner, Fred Astaire, Anthony Perkins
Votes: 14,404 | Gross: $11.00M
14. Silkwood (1983)
R | 131 min | Biography, Drama, History
A worker at a plutonium processing plant is purposefully contaminated, psychologically tortured and possibly murdered to prevent her from exposing worker safety violations at the plant.
Director: Mike Nichols | Stars: Meryl Streep, Kurt Russell, Cher, Craig T. Nelson
Votes: 22,192 | Gross: $35.62M
15. Special Bulletin (1983 TV Movie)
103 min | Drama
A TV reporter and cameraman are taken hostage on a tugboat while covering a workers strike. The demands of the hostage-takers are to collect all the nuclear detonators in the Charleston, SC... See full summary »
Director: Edward Zwick | Stars: Ed Flanders, Kathryn Walker, Roxanne Hart, Christopher Allport
Votes: 1,325
16. Testament (1983)
PG | 90 min | Drama, Sci-Fi
The life of a suburban American family is scarred after a nuclear attack.
Director: Lynne Littman | Stars: Jane Alexander, William Devane, Rossie Harris, Roxana Zal
Votes: 7,217 | Gross: $2.04M
17. The Atomic Cafe (1982)
Not Rated | 86 min | Documentary, History
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.
Directors: Jayne Loader, Kevin Rafferty, Pierce Rafferty | Stars: Paul Tibbets, Harry S. Truman, W.H.P. Blandy, Brien McMahon
Votes: 4,534 | Gross: $0.02M
18. The Children's Story (1982 TV Movie)
30 min | Drama
A just-established totalitarian government places a new teacher in a classroom of young children while the old teacher is sent away. The new teacher challenges the students' view of their ... See full summary »
Director: James Clavell | Stars: Mildred Dunnock, Michaela Clavell, James McCall, Michelle Francoeur
Votes: 75
19. The China Syndrome (1979)
PG | 122 min | Drama, Thriller
A reporter finds what appears to be a cover-up of safety hazards at a nuclear power plant.
Director: James Bridges | Stars: Jane Fonda, Jack Lemmon, Michael Douglas, Scott Brady
Votes: 33,019 | Gross: $51.72M
20. The Peacemaker (1997)
R | 124 min | Action, Drama, Thriller
A US Army colonel and a civilian woman supervising him must track down stolen Russian nuclear weapons before they're used by terrorists.
Director: Mimi Leder | Stars: George Clooney, Nicole Kidman, Marcel Iures, Aleksandr Baluev
Votes: 62,355 | Gross: $41.26M
21. The Sacrifice (1986)
PG | 149 min | Drama
At the dawn of World War III, a man searches for a way to restore peace to the world and finds he must give something in return.
Director: Andrei Tarkovsky | Stars: Erland Josephson, Susan Fleetwood, Allan Edwall, Guðrún Gísladóttir
Votes: 30,960 | Gross: $0.30M
22. The War Game (1966)
48 min | Drama, War
A docudrama depicting a hypothetical nuclear attack on Britain.
Director: Peter Watkins | Stars: Michael Aspel, Peter Graham, Dave Baldwin, Kathy Staff
Votes: 7,299
23. Thirteen Days (2000)
PG-13 | 145 min | Drama, History, Thriller
In October 1962, the Kennedy administration struggles to contain the Cuban Missile Crisis.
Director: Roger Donaldson | Stars: Kevin Costner, Bruce Greenwood, Shawn Driscoll, Drake Cook
Votes: 62,677 | Gross: $34.59M
24. Threads (1984 TV Movie)
TV-MA | 112 min | Drama, Sci-Fi, Thriller
The effects of a nuclear holocaust on the working class city of Sheffield, England and the eventual long-term effects of nuclear war on civilization.
Director: Mick Jackson | Stars: Karen Meagher, Reece Dinsdale, David Brierly, Rita May
Votes: 20,061
25. Twilight's Last Gleaming (1977)
R | 146 min | Drama, Thriller
An imprisoned rogue USAF general with a secret personal agenda, escapes the brig and takes over an ICBM silo, threatening to start WW3.
Director: Robert Aldrich | Stars: Burt Lancaster, Richard Widmark, Roscoe Lee Browne, Joseph Cotten
Votes: 3,724
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