On the Beach, The Day After

Posted on February 22, 2023 by tvschmidt

Tim Van Schmidt

The Ukraine-Russia war has been going on now for a full bloody year. The Doomsday Clock has moved closer to midnight than it has ever been. Here are some reviews of a couple of movies that face up to the most terrible fear that has come from modern conflict — nuclear war.

“On the Beach”: This 1959 movie — released three years before the Cuban Missile Crisis — does not so much show the physical devastation of a nuclear war as the mental devastation that follows far from ground zero. The war happens in the northern hemisphere, but the creep of radiation is destined to ravage the south.

The movie begins as an American submarine makes its way to Australia after escaping the widespread destruction in the north — apparently they are the only ones who make it out alive.

While things are still sunny and appear somewhat normal in Australia, despite shortages of basic supplies, the approaching radiation hangs heavy over everybody. Some people drink to excess, some stubbornly deny the situation, some go fishing, and some even desperately fall in love. But everybody is doomed.

The most gripping sequence in the movie is when Fred Astaire’s character enters the final Grand Prix road race in Australia. It is literally a race to the absolute finish. It comes off a lot like the crazy vehicle mania of the “Mad Max” movies (also post-apocalyptic tales) with cars crashing and flaming out, killing the participants, leaving only one vehicle blasting across the finish line. It is a bitter victory.

When the radiation finally reaches Australia, it’s clear there really are no victories.

“The Day After”: There is a scary coincidence between this movie and the present. The nuclear war here occurs during a conflict between the Soviet Union and NATO forces. In this case, the Eastern Bloc occupies West Berlin, then a Western-controlled stronghold surrounded by Communist territory. Things go from bad to worse and it escalates into the ultimate horror.

But like “On the Beach”, the movie action happens many thousands of miles away from the actual conflict — in Kansas. The story starts out with the everyday activities of several characters, but the news gets worse as the hours roll on.

While everybody in the Midwest is stunned by the start the war, on edge by the fear of what could and does happen, one character asks out loud how bad it could be when they are living “in the middle of nowhere”. A young John Lithgow answers simply: “There is no middle of nowhere”, pointing out that there are Minuteman missile silos all over the region — each one is not only a weapon, but also a target.

“The Day After” does not pull any punches when the missiles start flying — everything turns into a blazing inferno, people disintegrated in a second. Once it’s “over” it is the sad duty of the survivors to pick up the pieces of what’s left of civilization as radiation sickness overwhelms them.

When “The Day After” — one of the most watched TV movies in history — came out, the threat of nuclear war, thanks to the proliferation of these horrible weapons, was a most urgent issue. Thanks to the current conflict in Ukraine, it still should be.

At the end of “On the Beach”, with the streets empty and people extinct, a banner still flaps in the breeze that reads: “There is still time”. It remains a poignant message today.

Check out “Time Capsules by Tim Van Schmidt” on YouTube.

Movies: Alarming Visions of the Future and Past

Posted on February 7, 2023 by tvschmidt

Tim Van Schmidt

For some, celebrating the coming of the New Year is a mix of remembering the past and looking forward to the future. In that spirit, here are two movies that do just that.

First, I put on a disk of one of my favorite sci-fi movies — “Soylent Green” from 1973 — and I was shocked to see that the date of the action was “The Year: 2022”.

Then I was shocked again as I watched the movie. A lot of it is exaggerated, of course, but then again it was also alarmingly right on.

Here’s what the world of the future (2022) looked like in 1973: over-populated, garbage piled up, pollution changing the climate to a sweltering constant summer, nature disappeared, food ultra expensive for the rich, shoveled out in inscrutable processed filler for the masses, people wearing masks, rampant homelessness, assisted suicide, dark political and corporate manipulation on a mass scale, personal power versus a pervading feeling of hopelessness, women treated as furniture, jobs critically at risk — essentially the rich elite versus the masses.

The savvy opening sequence tells a lot of the story with photos, beginning with nostalgic images of a more innocent past, then images of deterioration piling up faster and faster into a mind-numbing mess.

The storyline of “Soylent Green” follows the investigation into what begins as a ho-hum routine murder case for a rough-neck cop — Charlton Heston — but ends up revealing a truth that twists the minds of all who learn it.

This is Edward G. Robinson’s last film and he plays an elderly “book” that does the research for Heston’s investigations. He’s also always telling the detective about the good old days (“When I was a kid, food was food”) and eventually “goes home”, devastated by too much information.

When Heston’s character tells him, “I know, I know…when you were young, people were better”. Robinson responds: “Awww, nuts — people were always rotten — but the world was beautiful”.

Let’s hope our future doesn’t go where this movie goes.

The Northman: Next, I put on “The Northman”, a 2022 release featuring Alexander Skarsgard, which is another kind of fiction — looking far back into the past — revealing just as harrowing a vision as “Soylent Green”. It’s brutal and harsh and those are the good times.

Here, a young prince is denied his birthright when his uncle kills his father, steals his crown, and his queen. The prince escapes but lives a life of hardship on his way to becoming a fierce warrior.

Upon hearing his uncle has lost his throne, the deposed prince resolves to endure whatever he must — and that’s a lot — in order to avenge his father and fulfill an old curse. Never mind the fact that he meets an excellent partner on the way who bears him twin babies. He leaves them dumbfounded on a boat while he dives back into the sea to go finish his murderous errand.

“The Northman” is a story of not so heroic Viking culture — it is a cheerless existence, one of violent conquest, murder, deceit, slave trading, squalid conditions, primitive beliefs, superstition, and the inscrutable power of the natural world. Add in soul-eating vengeance and it’s not pretty.

“The Northman” portrays a past we don’t want to go back to. “Soylent Green” is a future we don’t want to go to. The value of each is to teach us about what we don’t want and should avoid.

Explore “Time Capsules by Tim Van Schmidt” on YouTube.

Travel Dreams are Back

Posted on February 6, 2023 by tvschmidt

Tim Van Schmidt

I burst the pandemic travel bubble this year with several domestic trips. Mostly it was about family, but that doesn’t mean there weren’t good times.

On the way to Catalina Island in southern California, for example, my boat passed through an enormous pod of dolphins, countless animals breaching the water and diving in for as far as the eye could see.

In northern Wisconsin, I rose early in the morning to see a lake as beautifully still as glass. At night I could hear the loons’ mournful calls.

In New Jersey and Pennsylvania just recently, I saw the colors of autumn splashed across the hills — bright reds, oranges, and yellows.

However, I did not get out of the country. I had some plans — like returning to Israel or touring Taiwan with a native — but they got sidelined.

Some of my best travel memories are from my international travels and I cherish them like special dreams. Some of them are not much more than just cool, unforgettable moments:

Mayan ruins in Tikal Photo by Tim Van Schmidt

I am walking in the jungle in Guatemala, headed toward the Mayan ruins of Tikal. Monkeys are jumping overhead, toucans are chattering on tree branches, leaf-cutter ants are parading by on the forest floor. Suddenly a herd of miniature pigs breaks through the underbrush and stampedes across the path.

I am visiting the city of Leningrad in Soviet era Russia and it is during the “White Nights”. We were dinner guests of a Russian family and one of the relatives was a taxi driver — and had his own car. So at midnight, after pounding shots of vodka “like a true Soviet man”, we enjoy a late night tour of the city, ending on the parapets of the Peter and Paul Fortress. Afterwards, the taxi driver stops a factory truck and comes back with warm, fresh bread for breakfast.

I am on an overnight ferry from Denmark headed to England. I’m hunkered down on a deck chair, watching the sky lighten up, tired, but not able to fall asleep. The water, the sea air, the half-light all combine to wash away everything else but this moment.

In Israel, I am visiting Apollonia and in the ruins is a room with a huge stone arch facing out to the Mediterranean Sea. It’s a hot day, and as I stand at the open archway, I can see up and down the coast, the sea breaking hard on the cliffs below. I imagine I am an ancient soldier, posted there to watch the waterways.

I look forward to making some new special memories in the near future.

What’s it all about? Experience, plain and simple. I think the point is to get out of your usual habitat for while. Seeing how other people live helps give you perspective on how you live your life.

You can find these experiences close to home, for sure. But the further afield you go — to another country, even another continent — you get an even wider view on life.

In Oslo- Vigeland Park sculptures Photo by Tim Van Schmidt

Now, I wonder: if I could travel somewhere abroad, where would it be? Where can I find new special memories of foreign places?

In my dreams, I am walking through a cathedral made of stone. At my feet are the resting places of saints and light sprays through long windows on high. Here is a kind of immortal silence made reverent by a million bent knees.

I am thinking that this is in Spain. Maybe that’s where I should go.