I am just watching the movie SOLAR ATTACK on the Horror Chanel. It's a standard E.L.E genre film, E.L.E an abbreviation for Extinction Level Event. Solar Attack is about the Sun's corona setting fire to pollution in the Earth's atmosphere, stripping away the sky. It stars erstwhile Martial Arts star Mark Dacascos as a world-saving mega-brainy super-pilot.
The term featured heavily in the American blockbuster DEEP IMPACT, in which an asteroid hits the Earth. It starred Teone Leonne as the newsreader covering the end of the World. ARMAGEDDON covered similar ground around the same time but out in space, the heroes in that film being a group of miners lead by Bruce Willis.
My favourite E.L.E film is the old black and white THE DAY THE EARTH CAUGHT FIRE. A slow burner, it also uses journalists to reveal the true scale of the impending calamity, in this case, a steady increase in the earth's temperature brought on by nuclear tests shifting the planet's axis.
The gradual rise in unbearable heat is neatly contrasted with the slow drip of official information about the disaster. Only the keen nose of a burnt-out hack gets to the truth and gives the World the knowledge it needs to survive. Think of a Sci-Fi version of All the President's Men and you are near the mark.
What's your fave Armageddon movie readers?
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