kingdaevid Review of In the Year 2889

In the Year 2889 (1969 TV Movie)

As cinematic cheese goes, this is some great aged brick...

[9/10 · 24 May 2004]

Back in '71 and '72, the local one-lung independent TV station I grew up watching subsisted on a weekend schedule of AWA pro wrestling, Milwaukee Brewers or Bucks games, "Roller Game of the Week" (the L.A. T-Birds version) and every American International film ever released to television syndication. This was one of those movies. Essentially a colour updating of THE DAY THE WORLD ENDED (which was also frequently run on that station, once right before this very picture), IN THE YEAR 2889 covers pretty much the same territory as NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD (produced around the same time), except that it's a nuclear holocaust the housebound survivors are trying to live down rather than zombies. Paul Petersen gives a fairly good performance of what they handed him here. Look for it in one of those super-cheap DVD boxes of 10 or 20 movies on the same theme that the Brentwood label puts out.