As a person who has had lifelong effects from the Cold WA (we lived next to a potential target, Boeing) I initially saw this film as a Cold War nightmare.
As it kept replaying, I saw Hegseth, Noem, and all the other administration idiots in those places and our assured demise. At least during the Cold War I was assured there were serious. level-headed people in charge.
The only sympathy I felt in the film was when the Secretary chose not to get on the helicopter because that is the choice everyone is faced with and his was a valid option. Many of us came out of that time with an understanding that life is conditional.
I was curious why the film was made thinking it had to have been someone who experienced the Cold War but it was written by a 40-something ex-NBC News boss. Kathryn Bigelow was of the age to have experienced the Cold War and Travis Air Force Base was near where she grew up. It would be nice to hear her personal experience.
The glaring fault of the story was the omission of waiting until the bomb hit the US and then deciding.
The film affected me emotionally due to our Cold War past and now I have to realize that the people in charge of our country are incapable of handling something like this. Nothing will help us. Also, I realized young people do not have personal experience with the end of civilization as we did - now it is just trump pulling the levers.
As a film though, I did not like the clunky replaying of the same discussions. There are so many devices that could have shown it differently.
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