Threads was originally a television drama released by the BBC in 1984, set in England of that same era. The story unfolds through the eyes of two middle class famlies in Sheffield, tracing the steps that lead the U.S. and Russia to enter into nuclear war, and depicts the months and years that follow the war in horrifying and realistic detail. As the film's characters struggle and suffer in the aftermath of such clearly protrayed nuclear destruction,
Threads is terrifying as a horror movie but likely even scarier because of its basis in reality.