directed by:
Terry Winnan written by: Terry Winnan genre: Drama, Action |
“Well, we’re gonna get nuked – I’m serious.” Clearly, this is gonna be grim! And I’m here for it. “The Days Ahead” serves up the fear of being nuked three ways in order to give you a mushroom cloud’s worth of anxiety that’ll keep you up at night thinking about all the wonderful ways we can get vaporized. As you start the first chapter of this anthology, called “Stranded,” you’ll see it doesn’t take long at all before Writer/Director Terry Winnan takes you from the theoretical into the all-too-possible. We’re talking about explosions, injuries, and a whole lot of running around with our main characters realizing they’re likely completely unprepared for such a life-altering event. With four coworkers trapped on the inside of a single room with next to no resources - and an actual pot to piss in, together they mull over how bad the effects & fallout might be, and whether or not they’re going to live or die. You’ve had some terrible days at the office, I’m sure – but have they ever been THIS bad? They might not even get to go home again, let alone get something to eat.
Watching this opening story in Winnan’s anthology made me realize just how little we know about what we can do in the aftermath of a nuclear attack. None of these people, whether it’s the well-intentioned paranoia of Phil, or the smarmy attitude of a corporate bro named Steve – no one actually knows how safe it is or isn’t to go outside of their office walls, which introduces a very reasonable terror that puts us right into the room with them, wondering how we’d handle such extreme circumstances. Is there anything anyone can do? Can we stop the effects of nuclear fallout by sealing ourselves into a room and lining the door cracks with towels? How far away do you need to be from a blast to be considered okay and/or not in danger of radiation? Should you just go outside and enjoy what little time you have left before being eaten from the inside out? It’s actually how little you know that ends up being the most terrifying aspect of watching “The Days Ahead” – because “when the shit hits the fan,” you realize it’s really not that easy to work together. Are the voices they can hear outside in the hallways friends or foes? Even if they’re friends, have they endured so much radiation that it could poison those around them? Is it better to stay in one place or try to find some other place that might not be as safe as the one you’re already in? The number of questions that “Stranded” will have you asking yourself right off the bat feels like a genuine gut punch. Even after watching it, I still didn’t feel like I came to a conclusion on what the best route to take would be if I were caught in a similar situation. I found myself hoping that part two of the anthology, called “Prepared,” might have more answers than the number of questions I now felt myself pondering on an endless loop in my head. I started looking around my own house. I don’t even own a single gas mask! How the heck am I gonna survive the fallout when it comes? I’m woefully underprepared. Obviously, in some ways I’m kidding – I’m sure that the majority of us don’t have one gas mask in our house, let alone the amount we’d need to theoretically protect our loved ones…and even IF we did, we’d still have to wonder about the make & manufacturer…did they cut any corners? Are we really safe just because we strapped on a mask? Ask all those people who purchased faulty eclipse glasses how they’re feeling these days. My point is that we can be as “Prepared” as we like, but in an event as catastrophic as this would be, no amount of Doomsday Prepping is likely going to be enough. Part two of Winnan’s film has us hunkered down with a small family, wondering if their house is going to protect them enough as the radiation spreads. To be fair, this family is more “Prepared” and ready than most would likely be, and to my point, you still see the fear and confusion they have as they wonder if any of it will keep them safe. All of the small things we take for granted in a connected world that’s always online – poof – they become useless…and unless you downloaded a bunch of movies to keep you entertained before the bombs went off, you’re really stuck doing a whole lot of nothing but worrying and trying to keep calm. Is a sore throat just a sore throat? Or is that a sign of the death knell? Even if you needed help – who wouldn’t need help in such a calamitous event? We’d all need some…and so, none of us would get any.
“The Days Ahead” never stops presenting more dangers as it plays on, and reminding us that we could never be as “Prepared” as we’d need to be, which in itself is terrifying, especially when you consider how close the ol’ Doomsday Clock is to midnight at the present time. Resource guarding…survivalism…I mean, YOU know full well how the human race would behave in a situation like this & it ain’t good! Even IF we survived a full-on blast, would there be anything more dangerous than human beings in the aftermath? Opportunism…looting…theft…lawlessness. Our entire world is held together with duct tape. The final installment of this three-part anthology is called “Post,” which begins with a family running towards a bomb shelter. Is life just different over there in the UK? “The Days Ahead” has forced me to confront just how little we fear global attacks here in Canada. I don’t even know if this country has ONE bomb shelter, let alone the kind of facility we could all hide & hang out in while the world recovers. “Now what?” ponders Paul as he has a radio discussion with another survivor, “we wait? To live? To die?” These are valid questions without a doubt, with answers that might not be what we wanna hear. This much I can promise you…even in moments where you’d assume that Winnan will take his foot off the gas for a moment and let you breathe, he’ll instead opt to turn the screws even tighter - and that can be seriously tough to take in. You get to a point where you just need a little bit of good news, and while there was an opportunity for a little in the tale of Paul’s family, Winnan once again went even darker with his material, projecting a tapestry of isolation, loneliness, and all-out despair. More so than any of the stories this film tells, it’s Paul’s tale of personal tragedy that proves we could never be as prepared as we hope, and that it’s outright impossible to prepare for every twist and turn in life anyway. It will not be an easy task, but if you can push past this very realistic depiction of what true terror would be like to experience, you’ll realize the underlying message is extremely clear. There is no way to prepare ourselves for what is well beyond our control – and the only thing we can ever do is live. Not just survive, but LIVE. What you’ll see in “The Days Ahead” is certainly an all-too-possible future that we could very well experience in our lifetimes…and so, I propose that before we get to such a horrific point, that we all get outside, breathe the fresh air, and be as grateful as we can be for every ticking second that we get to spend & share with our loved ones. Winnan’s a madman, but equally a genius as well. You’re going to feel all kinds of things you might not have ever even felt before in watching “The Days Ahead,” and a lot of that might be tough to reconcile. Just do yourself a favour and LIVE while you have the opportunity to do so…so that if you ever have to lock yourself away from the world, you know you did everything you could with the time that you had. There’s precious little I’d change about this film, save for a few of the more intense moments that could have had a little more sound effects to beef up the drama involved…but other than that, this movie is practically perfect and gets four & a half stars outta five from me. It’s delightfully terrifying, and perhaps more real than we’d want to admit that it is. |
|
|
More To Check Out.
|
