Sure, everybody knows that the apocalypse will be a time of much wailing of arms and gnashing of teeth. Millions will die, the world will become a barren wasteland, and the height of cuisine will be cold dog food eaten straight out of the can.
But why let a little post nuke depression get ya down? Allow me to guide you on a short journey of post apocalyptic joy....as created by the vast entertainment juggernaut of Hollywood.
10. Mad Max: The Road Warrior
World Ending Event: Nukes
The most obvious choice for this list is still one heck of a fun ride. Punks in souped up death machines versus Mel Gibson before he went all nuts. Extra Bonus Points for not a lot of plot to get in the way of cars driving really fast and crashing into each other.
9. A Boy And His Dog
World Ending Event: Nukes
Don Johnson portrays your average, run-of-the-mill, post apocalyptic teenager who roams the wastelands of America looking for food and sex. (although not necessarily in that order) Lucky for him he has a talking dog named Blood who can sniff out both. Laughs abound as our duo discovers an underground, sterile, society ruled over by Jason Robards who is in need of Don's "services." Make sure and see this one with a pet you love.
8. Logan's Run
World Ending Event: Overpopulation
I'm talking about the movie, not the lame TV series with Gonzo from Trapper John. Although the jumpsuits scream 1976 you gotta love a flick that glorifies the use of drugs and sex with multiple partners. It's for the best though if you fast forward through the scene with the robot in the ice cave. Extra bonus points for Farrah Fawcett with eye-popping nipple action.
7. Cherry 2000
World Ending Event: They don't say, I'm guessing it has to do with Melanie Griffith's hair dye.
Now some may say this flick is just schlock, a weird half breed stuck between the world's of post-apocalyptic and teen sex comedy....and hey, who am I to argue? I'm sure there's a much deeper message buried in here somewhere but I kinda blanked out after watching the guy's sex doll implode. And God help him but Lawrence Fishburn is in this thing playing the part of "Glu Glu Lawyer." I'm pretty sure this role isn't on his acting reel.
6. Red Dawn
World Ending Event: The Evil Soviet Union invades America's Heartland.
Wolverines!!!! Oh, has there ever been another battle cry that sent chills up your spine like that one? This mid 80s flick is kind of a cross between the Breakfast Club and Platoon except without all that boring exposition and plot development. Just sit back and watch in delight as Charlie Sheen and Patrick Swayze go around blowing stuff up with the help of Cy Tolliver from Deadwood. Extra bonus points for getting to see Ferris Bueller's sister blow away the bad guys with a machine gun!
5. Tank Girl
World Ending Event: Nukes
This 1995 flick, adapted from the comic of the same name, shows that the end of the world doesn't mean you have to lose your fashion sense. Basically Lori Petty spends an hour and a half imitating Gwen Stefani while Malcolm McDowell calculates how much money he's earning for each line of dialogue. Extra bonus points for Ice-T showing us how street he is by appearing as a talking kangaroo.
4. Soylent Green
World Ending Event: Overpopulation
Soylent Green is Wolverines!..wait...sorry, wrong movie. Anyway, in this bleak vision of the future the problem of overpopulation has become so pronounced that there's nothing to eat. But, hey, wait a minute, what about all these poor people? They sure do look yummy! Finally a film that proves that most Americans will resort to cannibalism if only the food companies will make our neighbors into tasty looking little green squares.
3. They Live
World Ending Event: Aliens From Outer Space
John Carpenter's black comedy that shows that kicking ass is another thing you can't do while chewing bubble gum. Former wrestler Roddy Piper gives the performance of his life as one of the few humans that can see the aliens overlords infesting the planet....and if you ever saw one of his wrestling interviews he use to do back in the day then you sorta know how the rest of the movie goes. Extra bonus points for one of the longest fistfights in movie history.
2. The Day of the Triffids
World Ending Event: Walking plants and blindness
Early 60s flick that showed the world what it would be like if everyone looked at the sun too long and plants got tired of being watered and talked to by old ladies. Our hero, Bill, wakes up from an eye operation to find out that a meteor shower has made everyone but him blind. On top of that is the double bummer that space seeds from the meteor have landed and are creating walking, flesh eating plants with an attitude problem. But everything turns out ok when it's discovered that salt water kills the plants. (I'm guessing M. Night Shayamalan saw this flick right before he made "Signs.")
1. 1990: Bronx Warriors
World Ending Event: Nukes
Yes, my number 1 pick for my happy-fun-time, end of the world list has to be this god awful, so-bad-it's-good, 1982 Italian ripoff of Escape From New York. This film has really got it all...a leading man who is supposed to be supermacho but just comes off as insanely effeminate...bad overdubbing...a street gang so evil that they dress up as mimes...and Vic Morrow's last role before his fate with John Landis and that helicopter. The Italians may know how to play soccer but they haven't got a clue when it comes to killing off humanity. This sucker is comedy gold.
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I think you'll find it's Jenny Agutter who gets her kit off in Logan's Run - if it's Farrah nipple you want, you need to be ready with the freeze frame on Saturn 3 - Scaramouch, King of Nip Slips.
(and I can't believe you left off the others from the Heston apocalypse trinity - The Omega Man & Planet of the Apes - and my all time favorite, On The Beach.)
Day of the Triffids should always be shown in a double feature with Night of the Lepus. Its tradition.
I wonder what would happen if the mimes from The Warriors and the mimes from 1990: Bronx Warriors got into a rumble.
How could you forget Six String Samurai? Other than that most of the list is perfect.
Red Dawn is a great flick, but how is it apocalyptic?
and Road Warrior is by far the best movie on the list.
"Panic in the Year Zero!" Ray Milland at his Millandiest, gratuitous Frankie Avalon, and a great Les Baxter score.
No Barb Wire? Still a fine list.
My life fades. The vision dims. All that remains are memories. I remember a time of chaos. Ruined dreams. This wasted land. But most of all, I remember the Road Warrior. The man we called 'Max'.
To understand who he was, you have to go back to another time. When the world was powered by the black fuel. And the desert sprouted great cities of pipe and steel. Gone now, swept away. For reasons long forgotten, two mighty warrior tribes went to war and touched off a blaze which engulfed them all. Without fuel they were nothing. They built a house of straw. The thundering machines sputtered and stopped. Their leaders talked and talked and talked. But nothing could stem the avalanche. Their world crumbled. The cities exploded. A whirlwind of looting, a firestorm of fear. Men began to feed on men.
On the roads it was a white line nightmare. Only those mobile enough to scavenge, brutal enough to pillage would survive. The gangs took over the highways, ready to wage war for a tank of juice. And in this maelstrom of decay, ordinary men were battered and smashed.
Men like Max. The warrior Max. In the roar of an engine, he lost everything. And became a shell of a man, a burnt out, desolate man, a man haunted by the demons of his past, a man who wandered out into the wasteland. And it was here, in this blighted place, that he learned to live again.
Speaking of Roddy Piper post-apocalyptic epics, I was hoping to see Hell Comes to Frogtown listed.
The IMDB synopsis is enough to render this film top of the list -
"'Hell' is the name of the hero of the story. He's a prisoner of the women who now run the USA after a nuclear/biological war. Results of the war are that mutants have evolved, and the human race is in danger of extinction due to infertility. Hell is given the task of helping in the rescue of a group of fertile women from the harem of the mutant leader (resembling a frog). Hell cannot escape since he has a bomb attached to his private parts which will detonate if he strays more than a few hundred yards from his guard."
Amazing!
What about Jean Claude Van Damme, any thing he was in was apocalyptical(I think that's spelled right}. With that roundhouse kick and full leg split. Cyborg anyone?
Man, good list, but Zardoz.
If you don't know Zardoz, for the love of God, look up the trailer. You will want to see this immediately.
"I have seen the future, and it is broken."
Night of the comet
2 hots chics live, drive around killing half dead comet freaks, while looking damn cute.
They Live: Not only one of the longest fistfights in movie history, but the longest fistfight about wearing a pair of sunglasses in movie history ever.