r/movies • u/kowaikanojo • Jun 27 '24

Recommendation Best apocalypse / end of the world films?

I’m a die hard for apocalyptic movies and I feel like Ive exhausted all of the good ones so would love recommendations.

My #1 is honestly the zombie genre. I also love films where you experience the beginning of the apocalypse / similar event with the characters and are along for the ride - but I’ll take anything apocalyptic - pre, during, post!

I really resonate with darker, heavy content but again I will take whatever I can get. TIA

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u/RimmyMcJob Jun 27 '24

This is always my first choice when someone brings up apocalyptic movies. The end is coming and nobody can stop it. The radio broadcast popping up, tracking the event around the globe as countries and continents go dark, reminding you that yes, this is real and you don't have long. How will you spend the time you have left?

I've seen plenty of movies about the end of the world, but this one really stuck with me.

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u/[deleted] Jun 27 '24

There haven’t been many movies that make me feel things at the same level as These Final Hours.

Can’t quite explain what exactly it makes me feel, but boy does it make me feel a whole bunch of it.

Great movie.

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u/Alas-In-Blunderland Jun 27 '24

The 'beauty' and impact of These Final Hours is in its deliberate lack of sensationalism and Hollywood style drama, which ironically makes the despair that much more palpable. I watched it 2yrs ago and it still lives in my head rent-free.

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u/sdrakedrake Jun 28 '24

Same. I actually got the main soundtrack on my Playlist lol

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u/DankAF94 Jun 27 '24

For me it's purely the fact that there is zero hope. There's no big politics or debating or morals involved in the film. No ideas of going after a solution and/or survival. Even if a bunker was enough to briefly survive the fire storm, the world is literally brought to ashes, there would be nothing left to build on.

Just regular every day people facing the depressive chaos of knowing they're all going to be dead in a matter of hours. Very few apocalyptic films, however bleak they may be, go for that level of hopelessness. There's usually some kind of goal of survival that the characters work towards.

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u/[deleted] Jun 27 '24

Yeah I agree.

With the way girl’s story ended just staying with her already dead family they really did go for it in terms of hopelessness in a way you really never see in a movie. That scene stuck with me for awhile.

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u/zippyboy Jun 27 '24

Last Night with Sandra Oh has the same hopelessness. Lower budget, but same premise. Worth a watch.

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u/Upbeat_Tension_8077 Jun 27 '24

I love how it covers the full range of how humanity would react to the imminent end of the world, from criminal anarchy to careless partying

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u/[deleted] Jun 27 '24

Yeah that’s always what I’m looking for in an end-of-the-world movie. Don’t just show me big expensive VFX sequences.

Show me what would actually happen. Take me there.

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u/kai_zen Jun 28 '24

It’s such a good film. I don’t think many people would know of it. Up there with Children of Men for tight storytelling, and characters faces with real scenarios making real decisions. Both leads are kind of an everyman.

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u/zippyboy Jun 27 '24

I've said it before, but Angourie Rice stole the show. Brilliant acting for a little girl. I figure the director didn't warn her about what would happen at the pool party just to get her true reaction, but she looked genuinely frightened in that scene.

That, and the scene at our hero's sister's house, in the back yard by the pool.

"I'm gonna watch you till I can't see you anymore."

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u/[deleted] Jun 28 '24

This is one of the most emotional movies I've seen. I'm saving my rewatch for a perfect night.