so this is a film I'd never heard of before and it only heard about it recently because this person recommended it in the comment section I checked out the trailer thought it looked promising so decided to check out the full film and you know I'm really glad it was recommended to me so thank you serious Allen Cyrus Allen serious Allen Cyrus Allen when the wind blows as a British animated film which was released in 1986 where we focus on an elderly English couple as they try to survive the aftermath of a Russian missile strike which is seemingly destroyed the entire country the film itself is actually based off a comic book which goes by the same name a comic which was created by Raymond Briggs who if you don't know is also the same guy behind the classic story of the Snowman this film has an interesting art style offers lots of emotion and gives an interesting look to what life in the Cold War era may have been like for the people at the time so let's have a closer look at the story the film has us following an elderly couple living in the English countryside James and Hilda there's nothing special or unique about this couple they are retired mostly stay in the house and only venture out to town every now and then typical items from the local shops and that's it they're your typical elderly couple whilst listening to the radio the couple hear warnings that there's an increasing chance of the Russians may launch a missile strike on the UK so for the first half of the film we focus on James taken precautions just in case the work should happen and follow instructions laid out in a government leaflet such as by-and-large food supplies and building a shelter out of doors and cushions now this may seem silly to us as a simple doorways and cushions isn't gonna do much to stop a nuclear blast I mean just like a Hiroshima for example but this is the actual advice the government would give to its citizens some instructional videos telling people to just drop to the ground and cover their face yeah as if that's gonna do anything the government knew this obviously wouldn't actually save anyone but it was done more as a placebo effect to give a piece of reassurance to prevent panic amongst the masses this included people like James and Hilda eventually in the film the UK is struck by a missile and James along with his wife Hilda do somehow managed to survive the blast whilst taking refuge in the shelter I really love the animation used as the explosion rips across the land coupled along with some really eerie music and the repeated line from Hilda concerned that the blasts will burn her cake as we see the rest of the world disintegrate around them dark humour at its finest now for the second half of the film we watch as the elderly couple do their best to survive in the now nuclear wasteland that is the United Kingdom this is where things begin to get darker and more emotional despite the horrific damage around them the couple still seem oblivious to the scale of the damage the missile is caused they find it odd that their papers haven't been delivered and that the milk hasn't been delivered they're more concerned with making their house look tidy for when visitors come over and when they begin to suffer radiation sickness they put it down to shock the final scenes in this film are tough you know the couple aren't going to make it despite their determination to maintain normality and you see them grow weaker and weaker scene by scene really does start to make it feel like someone is cutting onions nearby I've seen a lot of people make strong comparisons to this film and the Studio Ghibli film grave of the fireflies which you can check out my full review off if you haven't already and I can see how people would draw comparisons both films take place in a Maskell war both films focus primarily on two civilians caught up in the war and both films take a grounded realistic approach but there's also some strong differences as well first up grave of the fireflies is looking back at the Second World War and giving a neutral snapshot into the lives of the civilians during the conflict whereas this film is taking place in a fictional event and is trying to push the message much harder that war is bad and we shouldn't let it happen let me explain because at the time of this film's release the threat of the Cold War was actually still a thing I believe this film is targeting the audience who are in a similar mindset of our two main characters James and Hilda where James and Hill would have been a little older draw comparisons to the threat of the nuclear holocaust - the Blitz bombings of the Second World War they always seemed to reminisce back to the bomb shelters in a kind of nostalgic way like it was a bit of fun sort of like an adventure the shelters the blackout when the wind blows is highlighting that this modern-day threat is on a far greater scale and we should not be ignoring it or by any means kind of looking forward to it the belief that we will simply get through it with the whole keep calm and carry on attitude just isn't gonna cut it and that we should not be puttin all our faith into the government to keep us safe such as how James does with the leaflet hence why as sad as it may be it is essential that we do see the elderly couple suffer and ultimately die we also get a brief dig at the other side of spectrum through James's son where James tried to warn him of the threat over the phone but his son just laughed off thinking they'll never happen and if there does there's not much you can do about it and although it's easy for us to now look back on it as we know nothing ever did become of the Cold War you have to remember that at this time there really was a big fear going around there was the potential that two great superpowers could at any moment start launching mascot weapons at each other with just the push of a button and you kind of see this captured perfectly in the Films opening poster ordinary citizens caught between two massive superpowers this film isn't perfect however and there are a couple of negatives I would like to mention the first is that the opening seems really odd and out of place compared to the rest of the film it just abruptly starts with live-action military vehicles with this very 80s style rock track plane over the top it's not a bad song by any stretch of the means in fact it's sung by the legendary David Bowie but it just doesn't match the style of the rest of the film kind of feels like house on kids films will just slap on a pop track at the end out of place and almost forced there was also an odd moment about halfway through the film where the radio announces that the missile strike is inbound and suddenly James comes out with this line it just comes out of nowhere and feel so out of character considering throughout the rest of the film he's always avoided any sort harsh language constantly saying stuff like and even getting told off by his wife who using the B word which in this case was blimey it just didn't seem a sort of thing that he would suddenly come out and say I know it could be argued that in a panic situation people tend to drop their moles but even if we drop the language aspects of this it still seemed heavily out of character for him to talk to his wife like that and the final point isn't really a negative for me but I know it might be for some people and that is that the piecing can feel incredibly so at times especially in the first half although the total runtime is only around 50 minutes the entire film is just focusing on these two characters in just their house having very casual conversations with no real action or narrative being developed me personally I quite like this subtle style and I feel it makes the characters more real and relatable but I know this won't be for everyone so it's just fair warning on that part and let's quickly talk about the animation as well the animation for this film is an interesting one for the characters you have your traditional hand-drawn animation star with painted cells but for the house and some of its furniture you have this real-life objects which are stop-motion animated and for the outside sky you actually have live-action clouds it gives the film and interesting art style kind of reminded me of the hybrid animation used in the couch the Cowardly Dog series but at times I don't think it's utilized so well such as when the characters are interacting with the live-action props the stop-motion doesn't always line up with the hand-drawn animation mostly because the stop-motion has far fewer frames and can make the characters not feel like they're a part of the world they are living in in conclusion I would overall recommend this film as a watch it has a simple plot with simple characters but they're charming to watch and even manages to throw in some good humor every now and then at intervals stimulate group activities yes the pacing will feel slow to some but having that slow build up at the beginning allows us to get into the lives of our characters and ultimately leads to a big emotional payoff towards the end the very end animation style though not perfect does offer for some interesting visuals and a soundtrack that plays at the start and finish will definitely be sticking in your head afterwards I say if you've got an hour to spare give this film a watch it will offer you a different kind of story and a lot of emotion and if it doesn't well it's not the end of the world hey guys thank you very much for watching this review please leave a like if you enjoyed what you saw and comment below your thoughts on the film as well as any suggestions you might have for a future video because as you know now I do take know of them be sure to subscribe to catch the next dark and weird animated review and be sure to check out my other reviews appearing on the left here but until the next one guys take care