Film Review: ‘Countdown to Zero’ Paints Vivid Picture of Nuclear Threat

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CHICAGO – Lucy Walker’s “Countdown to Zero” is the most terrifying film of the year and one of the most frightening documentaries in a long time. The director pushes the envelope of taste a bit too far in the fear-mongering final act and underlines her point a few too many times in the process but the education that comes with the terror is a necessary one.

Rating: 3.5/5.0

President John F. Kennedy famously said, “Every man, woman and child lives under a nuclear sword of Damocles, hanging by the slenderest of threads, capable of being cut at any moment by accident, or miscalculation, or by madness.” Walker uses the quote as a regular reference point, putting it on the screen and highlighting sections to serve as chapter breaks for her detailed look at the nuclear threat.

Read Brian Tallerico’s full review of “Countdown to Zero” in our reviews section.

She begins with the concept of madness and how terrorists or maniacal world leaders could buy or even build a nuclear weapon to use on enemies, including the United States. Intercut with footage of hapless Americans walking the streets of major cities and maps with blast radii drawn on them, Walker vividly paints a picture of a world in which intentional nuclear annihilation is much more conceivable than you would ever like to imagine. With interviews with Russian workers who merely walked away with nuclear material and conversations about how it would be as easy to smuggle said material into the United States as it is to transport marijuana, the first half-hour of “Countdown to Zero” could reduce audience members prone to agoraphobia to tears.

Walker moves on to “accident” and details the number of countries who have nuclear power and the likelihood that someone could make a simple mistake with the deadliest substance in the history of mankind. It’s much more likely than your worst nightmares. Planes have flown over the United States with nuclear bombs ready to accidentally drop. A training tape was accidentally put in at NORAD and a shocking amount of items were checked off the response checklist before the mistake was realized.

Continuing reading for Brian Tallerico’s full “Countdown to Zero” review.

Countdown to Zero
Photo credit: Magnolia Pictures