For 1989 when this show aired, it had a pretty good grip on the future of technology and virtual reality. Ray Bradbury must have had the same, since he wrote the story this was based on way back in 1950. It succeeds in demonstrating what happens when families lose their human connection, turning over the parenting chores to things like television, and in the present day, laptops and cell phones. The kids in the story are virtual automatons, calling their parents by their first names and essentially calling their own shots in a highly mechanized home. When one of the suggestions offered by psychologist David McLean (Thomas Peacocke) is to 'shut the house down', it brings out the kids' worst instincts by taking over the programming of the nursery featuring an African veldt, well stocked with elephants, giraffes, and stampeding zebra. But the highlight of the scenario are ravenous lions who prowl the veldt in search of their next meal, wherein lies the solution for Patrick (Damien Atkins) and Wendy (Shana Alexander) Hadley. There are too many issues to contemplate once parents George (Malcolm Stewart) and Lydia (Linda Kelsey) Hadley become victims of their childrens' preoccupation, but on the face of it, the story hits hard with it's brutal finality.
5 Reviews
A Unique Futuristic Tale of Children and a High Tech Nursery
rigovega9 September 2019
The Veldt is much a better story when it is read and not watched. If you consider the time when this first aired, then you might have a better opinion of this. As a fan of the writer, I can say this does a good job capturing the feel of the original source material. In that aspect, the episode succeeds remaining faithful to the short story.
Stay Out of Africa
Hitchcoc26 March 2015
This is one of the most famous of the Bradbury stories. It involves something that he was interested in: the house that runs itself, which causes a human disconnect. In such a house is a holographic "nursery." Two children, Peter and Wendy (do those names sound familiar, think Neverland) live with their parents in such a house and have everything handed to them but have almost no human connection. They even call their parents by their first names. It become apparent that an African setting in the nursery is more than that. It is real with real lions and elephants and a fixation on the life and death struggles between the hunters and the hunted. The adults try to fix things, but they are much too late to forge a relationship with their children. The children have developed a nearly sociopathic being with no regard for life. This is very disturbing over sixty years after the story was initially written. Much of the technology portrayed is here and the connection with our children is waning. Try this one on for size.
One of Bradbury's Best Stories - But a Lousy Production of it
rodney_h19 April 2021
My review title pretty much says it all: One of Bradbury's Best Stories - But a Lousy Production of it.
To see this story play out in much, much better fashion see it as portrayed in one of three Bradbury short stories in the 1969 movie "The Illustrated Man" (also by Ray Bradbury). Rod Steiger plays the father perfectly and it is a much more believable screenplay adaptation of one of Bradbury's best.
To see this story play out in much, much better fashion see it as portrayed in one of three Bradbury short stories in the 1969 movie "The Illustrated Man" (also by Ray Bradbury). Rod Steiger plays the father perfectly and it is a much more believable screenplay adaptation of one of Bradbury's best.
The Veldt
mikaylamdougherty16 November 2018
This movie is one of Ray Bradbury many stories. I would highly recommend this story but not the movie. It hits the key points of the story and for the time its not to bad of a set but for the actors. They where definitely not the best.
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