5 Post-Apocalyptic Films to Avoid during Covid-19
4 Weeks of Covid-19 driven isolation can really get to a person. It’ll drive you insane.
So much so that I’ve found myself drawn to Film and TV series that I haven’t given a moments thought in years. None quite so groan inducing as the list you’ll see below. While Covid-19 has robbed us of our way of life it has proven to be so unlike the post-apocalypse scenarios the below movies thought up.
Below is a list, not just of what movies to avoid, but also a commentary on why they are way Films to avoid during your Covid-19 Isolation.
Enjoy. Or don’t.
5. The Day of the Triffids
Taken from the novel of the same name. The Day of the Triffids, by English science fiction author, John Wyndham, depicts a post-WWII and pre-Cold War world where the majority of the world’s population is blinded by a meteor shower. After the world’s population are seemingly blinded this, in turn, is followed by an aggressive species of plants (Triffids) who start killing people.
The basic plot point of one protagonist Bill Masen (played by Howard Keel) is during the meteor shower he is lying in hospital with his eyes bandaged. A plot point that has been replicated in a variety of forms in movies like 28 Days Later, the end of Resident Evil and when Rick Grimes wakes up to a world infested with Zombies in The Walking Dead comic book.
While the essence of the film (and the book) are an original story it doesn’t change the fact that the majority of the film centers squarely around Bill Masen, a school girl and a bunch of convicts hiding in a chateau from killer trees.
Would it work as a modern day sci-fi/horror? Well, they tried that again in 2009 as a Mini-Series. It’s currently sitting at 5.6/10 on IMDB.
Keep this away from your Vegan friends!
4. The Happening
The argument could be made The Happening isn’t strictly Post-Apocalyptic and is more a disaster film. Though it is littered with a variety of tones and subtext that are more akin to the landscape of in the Post-Apocalyptic genre.
The Happening kicks off when people begin dying via mass suicide and although intially believed to be a deadly neurotoxin released into the air by eco-terrorists. It is soon learned that the airborne toxin is a defense mechanism in response to humanity and the centuries long pollution we have pumped into the air. By the end of the film, this mysterious neurotoxin abates and everything returns to normal. Typical M. Night Shyamalan.
If watching actors play brain dead zombies who aren’t actually zombies self suicide in all sorts of strange and uninteresting ways is your jam then this movie is probably still your thing. When the most interesting moment in a film involves a lawn mower scene – its quite clear its deserving of the “More Boring than the Covid-19 Virus” badge!
The Happening is currently sitting at 5/10 on IMDB. I hereby dub thee – The Crappening!
3. I Am Legend
The Best type of Movie is a Movie without Will Smith – and I Am Legend is a perfect example of this.
Based off Richard Matheson’s novel of the same name. I Am Legend should’ve been a theatrical grand slam with its post-apocalyptic world at the hands of a viral plague. Unfortunately, we’re left with Will Smith starring in Castaway. If Castaway were an empty city, post-apocalyptic landscape starring the entire earth as the island.
In a world that has already seen the end at the hands of a virus originally created to cure cancer leaving Neville (Smith) to contend with his own insanity and a horde of nocturnal mutants. The kicker is that Neville is naturally immune to the virus and sacrifices himself so the cure can be shared and ultimately save humanity.
Though Richard Matheson’s book has been sighted as an inspiration for George Romero’s Night of the Living Dead. Unfortunately, the most interesting point about I Am Legend is the nocturnal mutant vocals come from Faith No More/Mr Bungle frontman Mike Patton.
And that’s where the interest ends.
2. Waterworld
If anyone got obsessed with post-apocalyptic films in the late 1990s it’s Kevin Costner. Except he didn’t just obsess about them – he decided to act in them. Though no one knows why.
Released in 1995, Waterworld depicts a fantastical post-apocalyptic world hundreds of years in the future. The polar ice caps have melted down and most of Earth is underwater. Within this setting, a mutated mariner (Costner) reluctantly helps a woman and a young girl dry land.
With an overlay of themes like sexual slavery, starvation and cigarettes, the film provides leeway for boredom to set in. The most interesting points are Kevin Costner’s character finding the girl amid a heroic display of pyrotechnics. Then saving the girl from Dennis Hopper’s character.
A character who spends more time demanding attention from the viewer than Kevin Costner ever does. Though not as boring as the obvious contemporary, The Postman, it’s certainly not the most attention worthy 2 hours you’ll have.
45% on Rotten Tomatoes is well deserved when Kevin Costner spends all of Waterworld portraying the world’s worst Aquaman.
1. The Book of Eli
There isn’t a single post-apocalyptic war torn film that is a poster child for Pro-Christianity than The Book of Eli.
Starring Academy Award and Golden Glove winner Denzel Washington. Denzel stars as mysterious figure Eli who is on a quest to get his book to an unknown destination.
There’s a lot of walking, a lot of talking and a lot of famous actors starring in a film where the script does nothing to complement their acting chops. Surprising as it may be to find the likes of Gary Oldman, Mila Kunis and Jennifer Beals in The Book of Eli. The casting director could have cast a bunch of unknowns into their respective roles and the result would’ve still been the same.
The Book of Eli is little more than a low brow commentary on the importance the Christianity Bible has had on western civilisation. So much so, we are expected to accept Eli sacrificing his life as a logical outcome just so the last ever bible can get reprinted.
Very little in this motion picture entice the viewer or provide a commentary on the mistakes humanity is making. Those that do are what separate great post-apocalyptic movies from… well, this.
There are some films that should have not been made. The Book of Eli is one of them.
