A family leaves L.A. for a camping trip - just before a nuclear bomb destroys the city. As the city descends into chaos, the father must fight to keep his family alive.A family leaves L.A. for a camping trip - just before a nuclear bomb destroys the city. As the city descends into chaos, the father must fight to keep his family alive.A family leaves L.A. for a camping trip - just before a nuclear bomb destroys the city. As the city descends into chaos, the father must fight to keep his family alive.
- Andy
- (as Neil Nephew)
- Roadside Diner Customer
- (uncredited)
- Radio Announcer
- (voice)
- (uncredited)
- Looter
- (uncredited)
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaThe Saddle Peak Lodge featured in the movie is an actual restaurant still open today. Located in Calabasas, CA.
- GoofsThe buck didn't stop here: Rick (Frankie Avalon) shoots a buck and carries it on his back up to where his father (Ray Milland) is standing. Rick lets the buck drop off his back, and it hits the ground and rolls behind him, until it disappears off screen. Camera angle switches to a close-up of Rick and his father talking. Then there's a wider camera shot as both father and son turn to look at the buck, but the buck is now lying on the ground almost right next to Rick.
- Quotes
Harry Baldwin: You get in the trailer with your mother and Karen.
Rick Baldwin: What for?
Harry Baldwin: It's going to get rough from here on - I may need some cover. If I stop the car, grab a shotgun. Don't get trigger happy, but don't be gun shy either. If you have to use it - use it.
- Crazy creditsOther than the title, all credits are at the end of the movie.
- ConnectionsFeatured in Aweful Movies with Deadly Earnest: Panic in the Year Zero (1969)
film." It may seem a bit campy by modern standards, but is actually well thought- out and acted. The early 60's were an era in which it seemed possible to
contemplate a nuclear war that broke down civilization's normal function
withOUT reducing the entire countryside to rubble. A man takes his family out into the country to escape the chaos, still clinging to the hope that normalcy and order will soon return. His wife is horrified at his newfound ruthlessness, and the kids seem willing to go with the new rules of the jungle.
Ray Milland was at one time an acclaimed actor, but his academy award for
"Lost Weekend" seems to have cursed his career. Now regarded as a "serious"
actor, suited only for "down" roles, he wasn't given much chance to work in the more "up" big-studio roles of the fifties. By the time he wound up at AIP, he was little more than a "has-been" to the public. But he retained real talent, as his directing and starring in this and other Sci-fi pictures of the period shows. When given a free hand, as in "Panic In Year Zero!" he took on challenges others
would have shied away from and showed that he still had a lot to offer. Sadly, big time directors continued to ignore him and the end of his life was defined by roles in "Frogs" and "The Thing With Two Heads" - films far worse than anything with Corman's name on them.
"Panic in Year Zero!" displays the basic conflict of compromise: Ray's character must compromise his beliefs and code of behavior in order to preserve what he cares for. His constant conflict with his wife displays the conflict between
differing ideas of what needs to be preserved - to her, saving the family by acts of savagery is unacceptable, and the only way to preserve civilization is to apply its rules in every situation. The ending seems to redeem Ray, but the fact is that the questions raised are answered by each viewer in the course of the film in his or her own way. Events in the film are not one-sided, and Ray's relation to the hardware store owner calls into question his position and correctness: perhaps by allying himself earlier with other decent people trying to survive, Ray could have saved his family from some of what it endures.
As we now re-acclimate ourselves to an era in which the possibility of "limited" nuclear attack (from national or independent terrorist groups) seems more likely than Mutual Assured Destruction, it is possible that films such as "Panic in Year Zero!" offer us important ethical problems. Problems we hope never to have to solve in real life, but which the screen offers a means to wrestle with in a safe environment.
- Vornoff-3
- Jun 14, 2003
Details
Box office
- Budget
- $225,000 (estimated)
- Runtime1 hour 33 minutes
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 2.35 : 1
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