Why We All Need to Watch More Disaster Movies
August 22, 2024

Why We All Need to Watch More Disaster Movies

 

From The Blob to They Live, disaster movies have been a champion topic in cinema, captivating audiences, provoking fear, anxiety, and pillow squeezing reactions.

 

 What is the attraction in devastating loss, destructive tragedies and history changing fictional events?  We have a few ideas:

 

Protected chaos: Watching disaster films allow us to experience extreme situations from the safety of a movie theater, or our comfy couch at home. This safe exposure to fear and anxiety can serve as a form of emotional release, with the height of the nail-biting climax to the quick-witted brilliant save at the end. (most of the time)

 Experience Our Fears: These movies often engage us with the possibility of society's concerns coming true. Climate change, pandemics, AI domination extreme weather and technological failures are recurring themes that resonate with fans, reflecting collective anxieties about what the future may hold.

Insight into Human Nature: Disaster scenarios strip away the norms, revealing true human behavior. Disasters prompt us to question how we might choose to act in extreme circumstances, challenging our assumptions about morality and survival.  Watching people make mistakes and learn the hard way, as well as those who seem to have the intuition and cleverness to make the genius but heart pounding last minute decisions, can be very thought provoking.  

 Testing the limits of human resourcefulness: These films frequently showcase human problem-solving and adaptability in the face of overwhelming odds, championing our human potential to think outside the box in times of extreme stress.

 Confronting our weakness: These movies can force us to examine our fragility, the possible insignificance of our existence, the unmatchable the power of mother nature, and the randomness of fate.

 Societal Critique: Many disaster movies subtly (or not so subtly) poke at power icons, mirroring our feelings on inadequacies in leadership, preparedness, or social equality that become glaringly apparent in times of crisis.

Discussion:  Disaster films can provoke enjoyable discussions on the likelihood of the scenario, what people did right, what they did wrong, and the idiotic moves that got them eaten or killed.

There is always a reset button: The end is rarely tragic for everyone.  These movies often end with a new beginning and the possibility of building a smarter better world. 

 As we watch these cinematic catastrophes, we're not just being entertained. We're actually engaging in a psychological exercise that challenges us to confront our fears, examine our values, and consider our part in an increasingly unpredictable world. 

Here is this author’s top 16  and a few series– What would you add, or take away? 

Grab some snacks and imagine yourself as the leading man or woman- would you make it?

 

 

The Day after Tomorrow - Climate Change
Castaway- Deserted Island
The Terminator - AI Domination
Super Volcano – Global Event
Twister – Tornado
Zombieland- Zombies
Don’t Look Up - Societal dysfunction
Dante’s Peak - Volcano (Local Event)
War of the Worlds - Alien Invasion
Independence Day - Alien Invasion
Armageddon – Meteor
Outbreak – Epidemic
Contagion - Epidemic
San Andreas – Earthquake
Earthquake (1974) - Earthquake
War Games - Computer Domination
 
Series
Jericho
Survivors (UK version)
Walking Dead

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