TV Cream

Films: H is for...

Holocaust 2000

Hmm. Nuclear power station owner Kirk Douglas suspects his son to be the Antichrist, who’s after the controls to the carbon rods for a bit of millennial meltdown mayhem. Cue loads of half-bothered anti-nuclear sentiment, some stock symbolism about the book of Revelations and a crucial equation looking vaguely like ‘Jesus’ written backwards, a bizarre nightmare sequence wherein the power station rises from the sea and turns into a bunch of grinning dragons in back-projected Supermarionation, some fun proto-Silence of the Lambs asylum set design, a rather nifty top-of-head-meets-chopper-blade death for a visiting dignitary, Douglas getting his kit off and being kicked about a padded cell, and some rather nasty stuff about abortion. This Anglo-Italian co-production effortlessly blends all that’s ludicrous about both nation’s horror traditions into one demented whole. But the laughs are mainly on Kirk Douglas. Especially whenever he’s acting ‘outraged on humanity’s behalf’, or pantless.

1 Comment

1 Comment

  1. THX 1139

    April 15, 2021 at 12:18 pm

    Kirk did like to whip his clothes off in his later years of screen stardom, didn’t he? Well, I say later years, it was practically his middle age considering how long he lasted.

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