SpuffyWeb Sadly Over-hyped

Fleur Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

Scarlet The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

Cristal The movie really just wants to entertain people.

abloke36-158-984501 I cannot understand how this movie has managed to get a 6.9 . Have the reviewers actually read Neville Shute's novel ?I was really looking forward to seeing this 2000 remake because On The Beach is a favourite of mine and have read the novel many times. The 1959 movie really did not do the tale any justice.However the tone of this movie, its pacing and script are just wrong. Too much time is spent on the sub and little time developing the characters.Special effects...appalling , corpses that were supposed to be two years old blinking. Did the radiation preserve the bodies ? San Francisco and the golden gate destroyed but Sausalito sparkles in the sun without a broken window.Worst of all is Dwight Towers and the changed ending. In the novel Moira sits ill behind the wheel, dying from radiation sickness abandoned. In this we have an ending which destroys the whole tone of the original novel. I do not really like remakes per se but we need a decent director to remake this blockbuster story but one which sticks to the characterisation and tone of the novel.If the novel needs extending in anyway then that should focus on the ways in which radiation sickness destroys the body. this movie did finally become involving once the sub arrived back in Melbourne but it was a long and dreary wait. 4/10 at best

manxman80 Both the original book, the first movie and this one ignore (probably for dramatic effect) the real effects of fallout and the movement of weather from northern hemisphere to southern hemisphere.In the real world fallout decays using a rule of 7/10. If you had a lethal radiation dose of 1000 rads one hour after detonation then 7 hours later the dose is down to 100 rads. 49 hours later down to 10 rads etc. It seems that a decreasing dose of 5-10 rads per day is survivable..not pleasant and with horrific genetic problems etc..but people would live. Also the air itself isn't radioactive its the dust carried in it. In the case of the Alaska mission by the sub, 2 years after the event the radiation would have been minimal. Also there isn't that much mixing between northern and southern weather systems. That much radiation would never reach Australia in the first place.Enough comments here on wooden acting...there should be a prize given for the worst American accent. The showing of 2 year old bodies was also strictly for daytime TV viewers..they assuredly don't look like the corpse of the unfortunate girl in the TV station with the famous solar powered laptop...The submarine used was apparently square in shape in some scenes..entirely studio based with stock photography used for outside views..would have been nice if the same class of sub had been used in all the shots. I counted at least 3 different vessels used.Some scenes worked but the hour or so of TV soap setting the relationship triangles was just tedious. Some scenes did work. The original book and movie were noted for how passively people accepted their fate. No riots, no social breakdown. Everybody just quietly went home to die. In this one we had riots, social mayhem etc.The endings of the characters were a mixed bag. Some worked, some were out of character. Scenes that did work were very very strong. The father walking around his house for the last time, carefully turning off the power before joining his wife to inject their baby girl with cyanide and them both drinking down the suicide pills, powerful powerful stuff.The final scene in both book and first movie works well. Moira, already dying of radiation sickness either sitting or standing by her car watching the submarine leave to be sunk out at sea and asking Dwight Towers 'If you are already on your way..then wait for me..' In this movie she was hale and hearty with what looked like a picnic in a basket. odd sort of scene. this leads onto captain Towers abandoning his command in their ultimate 'hour of need' is completely OTT. A captain would never do that.So a real mixed bag but worth a view.

hybridsun I watched this film last night, and enjoyed it very much. Making comparisons with the classic 1959 Stanley Kramer film is unfair however. Film making has progressed much since the late 1950s- and the Stark, black & white very understated 1959 film remains a classic for its time and forever.This 2000 update is a wee too long- but it keeps your interest most of the time.The color photography is lush and well done This film certainly takes into account contemporary society's change in 40 plus years, both socially and technologically- The films last hour is exceedingly depressing-even more then the first film. Grant Bowler is incredible in this film, and is as good as Anthony Perkins in the original- and Jackie McKenzie also does a great job as his wife.Worth watching because it updates Shutes Novel and the original film effectively.

zillabob This Australian production was aired as a 4 hour film in the US on some cable networks. It should have gotten a wider viewing. It's tremendous. Based on Neville Shute's novel of nuclear Armageddon, it's got a lot of Aussie humor as well as some stark images, and it's far more graphic(people throwing up with radiation sickness) than the original film. It drives home the point-or pointlessness-of nuclear war far more than anything like The Day After done here. All of these films wound up being a little nostalgic of a time when we worried about nuclear war.( Now, thanks to Bush and his idiot cronies, we're worrying again, because he's effectively re-created the feeling of the Cold War by provoking war, and recently Russia, again to a more defensive stance. One wonders if these people could watch a film like this and it would make a difference. Bush and his minority of right wing-nut religious supporters sadly want "Armageddon" because to them, they're going to some afterlife and, it in turn creates-to them-a "Biblical" prophecy fulfilled-rant over). The film has stand-out performances from Armand Assante, Byran Brown and Rachel Ward, and without giving away spoilers(you know the general story) it's griping and graphic in spots, pulling no punches on the effect that impending nuclear radiation has on a society. Brown has some fun throw-away lines, and in one case he "steals" some art from the national gallery, only to realize, everyone else is...what's the point, who will survive to enjoy it.