Cheap Testament (Video) (Jane Alexander, William Devane, Rossie Harris, Roxana Zal) (Lynne Littman) Price

Related Products

Customer Reviews of Testament

Arguably the best cautionary film about nuclear war, 'Testament' is remarkable because it relies not on stylistic special effects, but focuses on the physical and psychological horror of a family in the aftermath of a series of nuclear attacks.

It is the unknown that scares us the most, and the unknown precisely what the small community of Hamlin, CA has to deal with. Who has attacked America, and why? How much of the US has been decimated by the attacks? When will the government, or military, finally step in and supply the answers? At first the Wetherly family and their neighbors are optimistic, believing that they are the lucky ones.

But weeks stretch into months, and resources become scarce. There is no running water, electricity, and even the canned food supply is becoming scarce. The government officials never arrive. And then the radiation begins to show its effect, as one by one members of the community begin to die.

Jane Alexander is a tour de force as Carol Wetherly, a mother who can do nothing as her family members slowly pass away. Just watching her struggle to survive makes you feel simultaneously exhausted and devastated.

'Testament' is an important film because it shows the effects of a nuclear attack, not in terms of action stars or special effects, but the lives of ordinary human beings.

Displays the sometime power of an understatement
Two anti-war films were released in 1983: THE DAY AFTER and TESTAMENT. The former, released in the US as a made-for-TV movie, was visually sensational: missile launches, mushroom clouds, disfigured survivors, urban landscapes turned debris fields. However, the latter illustrates the notion that an understatement can sometimes be more commanding.

In TESTAMENT, Jane Alexander plays Carol Wetherly, the wife and mother of a 5-member family living in rural suburbia somewhere near Central California's Bay Area. Husband William Devane is off in San Francisco, never to return, the day the Soviet H-bomb falls upon it. Jane's character is left to manage alone the family's survival as their community, otherwise untouched directly by blast damage, copes with post-Holocaust disintegration. While some friends and neighbors leave the area for parts unknown, the Wetherlys remain.

TESTAMENT is not graphic in its depiction of nuclear war's devastation. What makes it absolutely compelling is the vision of a community, much like mine and possibly yours, and a particular family, everyday folks like you and me, facing the insidious effects of starvation and radiation sickness as they descend into the darkness necessarily to follow a nuclear exchange between superpowers. Ms. Alexander's performance is soul-wrenching and powerful, as when she cries out for God's damnation of those politicians that have reduced her world to an endless horror.

TESTAMENT is not a feel-good film, but certainly a great one. It's an exercise in bleak despair, and one which ultimately focuses on nothing more than the basic human instinct to survive - the final tribute to a species that has engineered the means for its own destruction.

This Movie will stay with you for days!
You think Titanic and E.T. were sad? Watch this heartbreaking movie and you'll be depressed for days.i am not kidding. this is an excellant powerful movie that will stay in your mind. JAne alexander is a mother with her three children and husband living in CA. when her husband is away on a business trip the unthinkable happens. and soon people everywhere are dying of radiation. Watching Jane Alexander trying to keep her family together just touches your heart. Many parts of this movie stay with you that other people have mentioned. This is not a movie you could watch over and over. The music by james horner is beautiful and haunting as well. the few times i have seen this movie after it is over, i either have tears rolling down my face or i am sitting there in stunned silence. Mainly the first. This is a highly recommneded movie!