MCBASTARD'S MAUSOLEUM: THE WAR GAME (1965) Severin Films 4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray Review + Screenshots

THE WAR GAME (1965)

4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray

Label: Severin Films

Region Code: Region-Free

Rating: Unrated

Duration: 48 Minutes 46 Seconds

Audio: English DTS-HD MA 2.0 Dual-Mono with Optional English Subtitles

Video: HDR10 2160p Ultra HD Fullscreen (1.33:1), 1080p HD Fullscreen (1.33:1)

Director: Peter Watkins

Cast: Dick Graham, Michael Aspel, Dave Baldwin

Peter Watkins' terrifying short film The War Game (1965) was produced for the BBC television, an anti-nuke film that was shot in black and white 16mm film, replicating a docu-drama/pseudo-documentary style that offers a mondo 'what if' scenario of a nuclear attack on Great Britain, particularly focusing on the communities of County Kent in Southeast England. The set-up involves tensions in Vietnam as the American forces in South Vietnam are authorized to use nuclear deterrents in response to an on-going Chinese invasion, in response the Soviet Union and East Germany threaten to invade West Berlin, causing the British government to declare a state of emergency, enacting their Civil Defense plan, which includes mass evacuations, food rationing and forced requisition of private residences to house evacuees. The government sends out pamphlets informing the public to build shelters in their homes and what ensues is a run on food and building supplies, causing unrest and panic in the streets as the threat of nuclear war looms heavy. We get numerous 'man on the street' style interviews that expose the general populace's lack of knowledge or ignorance of the nuclear threat, with one guy pulling out a shotgun and declaring he is ready for anything. Throughout the film the screen flashes texts and maps to exemplify logistical and statistical data and scenarios, and we get detached newsreel style narration running over it all, making it feel we are watching an all-too-real documentary/newsreel segment.

Eventually the tensions boil and the Soviets and East Berlin invade West Berlin, leading to a battle and then nuclear warheads are exchanged. The area outside of Kent is hit with a one-megaton nuclear warhead, and what plays out is a horrific accounting of how Britain's civil defense plan is woefully inadequate and ill-prepared to handle a nuclear war. The area, which is twenty-seven miles from the initial airburst, is struck with an intense heatwave from the furnace-like initial blast and the devastating aftershocks which ignite structures, leaving gruesomely charred bodies, while other survivors have their eyes melted out or suffer flash blindness after staring into the intense light from the initial blast. As the civil defense attempts to ration food supplies people are overcome with fear, desperation, and panic, storming the gated the facilities, overrunning them with armed conflict between authorities and an increasing desperate populace who are suffering from radiation sickness. Kent has been transformed into an apocalyptic hellscape where the authorities organize mercy killing squads and burn piles of corpses, as the population continues to suffer the effects of radiation sickness and malnutrition. Watkin's film is a nightmarish and frightening vision of the utter futility and hopelessness of a no-win nuclear war scenario.

Watkin's black and white 16mm film was deemed "too horrific" to air on the BBC television, perhaps due to some government intervention, fearing a War of the Worlds style public panic, though it did get private theatrical screenings and eventually did air on the BBC decades later. Watkins' anti-war/ant-nuke has lost none of its visceral edge these past sixty years, the social and political criticisms are still frighteningly accurate, and the depiction of a post-nuke Hell is still as harrowing now as it must have been now.

Audio/Video: The War Game (1966) makes its worldwide 4K UHD debut from Severin Films, now scanned in 4K from the original 16mm A/B rolls in 2160p UHD with HDR10 color-grade. The image looks very good, shot in black and white with a documentary cinema verité style, at time quite shaky and frantic, very grainy, with various scratches. The black and white image looks terrific with deep black, crisp whites and solid grayscale throughout. charred corpses and post-nuke destruction and panic look appropriately grim, gritty, and surprisingly gruesome. The 1080p Blu-ray included also features the same 4K restoration down sampled to HD without the benefits of the HDR10 color-grade, but it still looks quite solid, just slightly less so.

Audio comes by way of English DTS-HD MA 2.0 dual-mono with optional English subtitles. Mostly driven by dialogue and narration, very documentary style with staged sequences, early character testimonials and the later shell-shocked populace, the track is largely clean and sounds fine, while there's some occasional hiss or background noise during a few sequences, it's nothing egregious or ruinous.

The 2-disc 4K UHD/Blu-ray arrives in a side-loading Ridged Slipbox, which has some nice eye-catching lettering on the spine, inside there is a black keepcase housing the two discs, with a single-sided sleeve of artwork. Tucked away inside the keepcase are two Postcards, plus a cardstock Reproduction of a Dispersal Travel Pass, which is basically an evacuation pass. Also housed inside the slipbox is a reprint of Peter Watkins’ 1967 book of 'The War Game', which has been out-of-print in American since 1967.

Typical of Sevein we get a very well-stocked release with over five hours of extras, beginning with a 7-min Introduction By Filmmaker Alex Cox (Repo Man), and an Audio Commentary With Film Critic Kim Newman And Director Sean Hogan that is both an appreciation of the grim 'what if' story, and a bit of dissection of the strong-willed director who Newman points out often bit the hand that fed him so to speak.

We also get a 25-min Conflict By Design – Interview With Anne Davey Orr, Production Designer On CULLODEN And THE WAR GAME, who goes into how she met Peter Watkins, making Culloden, working on-the-fly with very little money, relying on ingenuity to get the job done, noting the the unusual style of the film, which was a period setting that had a modern commentary. She said that Watkins was quite determined and digs into her own archives for some great BTS photos and handwritten letters from Watkins during the era of The War Game, mentioning that he was RADA trained, and that he provided the film's the narration. Other topics include creating the civil defense literature and ration books, ID cards, the locations, and the numerous challenges during the production,

Other extras include the The 47-min Who Banned THE WAR GAME? – An Interview With Peter Watkins Historian John Cook that dives deep into how the BBC ended up not airing the film after fear of a panicked populace, which included the British government intervening. There's also an 18-min Games Of Fact And Fiction – Video Essay By Dr. Alexandra Heller-Nicholas And Filmmaker Stephen Broomer, 13-min THE WAR GAME At Cine City – Featurette By Journalist Eric Veillette, 31-min Nuclear Britain – Interview With Attack Warning Red!: How Britain Prepared For Nuclear War Author Julie McDowall, 22-min Archival Interview With Editor Michael Bradsell, 45-min Peter Watkins Reflects On THE WAR GAME And The Media – 1983 Interview From The Australian Film Television And Radio School (AFTRS), 2-min Introduction To THE WAR GAME In Sheffield By Visions Producer John Ellis, and the 43-min THE WAR GAME In Sheffield – Peter Watkins Recruits For A Proposed WAR GAME Remake In Unused Footage For The UK TV Show Visions, with the would-be producer talking about how a panned remake fell through. We also get the Trailer, plus a pair of Peter Watkins Short Films by way of The Diary of an Unknown Soldier (16:30), The Forgotten Faces (18:55). The only extras on the UHD disc are the commentary and the trailer, all other extras are featured on the Blu-ray disc.