Weekend (1967)
French New Wave/Downfall of Civilisation
Jean-Luc Godard’s classic of the French New Wave where a couple’s journey into the countryside for the weekend becomes increasingly more surreal and anarchic
Social Collapse
Social Collapse concerns the dissolution of the bonds of civilised order and a society’s fall into anarchy and barbarism. This is frequently depicted in terms of rioting, rampant lawlessness, looting and lack of individual safety. As this becomes more widespread, we see groups maintaining a tenuous coexistence or mutual defence in the absence of widespread law and order. Where any form of society regathers in the aftermath, it usually consists of small self-contained communities or is governed by warlords.
Stories range all the way from the beginning of collapse to the immediate aftermath of the fall of civilisation. Stories set after that point are dealt with under After the Holocaust. Films frequently concern a small group seeking to get to a place of safety as the world is in the process of collapsing into anarchy.
The cause of social collapse is some form of Catastrophe – be it revolution, Alien Invasion, Plague and Pandemic, a zombie apocalypse, an outbreak of Nuclear War, or circumstances that are smaller and more localised in scale.
Red Dawn (2012)
North Korean Invasion of the USA
The idea of remaking John Milus’s ridiculous 1984 survivalist fantasy about a Communist invasion of the USA maybe counts as one of the most absurdly unnecessary of all remakes. The film laughably tries to deal with the absence of a Soviet Union by creating a boogeyman out of North Korea
Reign of Chaos (2021)
Deities War in the Aftermath of Civilisation
Low-budget film that takes an ambitious conceptual grasp in its story of deities and daughters of goddesses warring in the ruins of civilisation
Nightfall (2000)
Isaac Asimov Adaptation
Isaac Asimov’s Nightfall, about a planet surrounded by six suns that only experiences nightfall once every thousand years, is considered the No 1 classic science-fiction short story. On film, it has alas befallen two impoverished versions from Roger Corman of which this was the second
Supernova (2005)
Solar Disaster
Disaster TV mini-series about the end of the world due to the sun about to go supernova. Cliche plotting, canned action scenes and bad science ensue
Transit 17 (2019)
Zombie Film
Belgian zombie film about a military unit assigned to travel through zombie-infested territory to rescue a girl who has an immunity
Lord of the Flies (1990)
Reversion to Barbarism
Remake of William Golding’s classic work about boys stranded on a desert island descending into barbarism where the book is disastrously Americanised in a clodding adaptation that misses the original’s rich swim of symbolism
Delete (2013)
Artificial Intelligence Amok
The return of the talented Steve Barron after a decade’s absence in a film that was shot in my own backyard (literally). Disappointingly, all we get is a work that unimaginatively rehashes cliches about amok A.I.s
Quarantine LA (2013)
Zombie Film
Zombie film with a party of survivors trying to make it through a zombie-infested L.A. to safety
Jubilee (1978)
Punk Future
Early Derek Jarman film that acts as a snapshot of the 70s punk movement, a rambling indulgent treatise that depicts a future England that has collapsed into anarchy
The Hole (1998)
Urban Disorder
Tsai Ming-Liang film made to celebrate the millennium about the taunting relationship that grows between a man and a woman affected by a hole left between their apartments by a plumber
Honey Pupu (2011)
Mysterious Disappearances
A confusing Taiwanese film about a series of mysterious disappearances. This is a film that feels like a series of random improv scenes constructed without anything resembling a plot
Left Behind – Vanished: Next Generation (2016)
Young Adult/Christian Rapture Film
There have been the various adaptations of the Left Behind books about the Biblical Rapture; this is an attempt to spin the same off for Young Adult audiences and is not very good
Urge (2016)
Designer Drug Causes Mass Insanity
The use of a designer drug causes a small island to descend into mass insanity – this is essentially The Crazies repackaged as a slick empty-headed thriller for teen audiences. The various scenes of madness are frequently laughable and the film arrives at possibly the most ridiculous twist ending one has ever seen
Movie 43 (2013)
Anthology of Bad Taste Comedy Skits
An anthology of comedy skits that sets out to be in as bad taste as possible – you are left astounded how far a film has to go to offend in this post-South Park era. That and wondering if the producers had kidnapped some of the stars’ family members to force them to participate
Mayflower II (2020)
Christians Launch a Space Mission
An hilariously bad film in which Christians launch a space mission to flee a Bible-censoring dystopia on Earth
Xombies 3D (2011)
Norwegian Zombie Film
Amid the vast horde of low-budget zombie films of the 00s, this Norwegian effort in 3D emerges as possibly the worst. It has no discernible plot, while the gore only consists of cheap digital overlays that looks like Monty Python cutout animation