50 Fun Facts About Apocalyptic Movies

Which ruined landmark on a deserted shore reveals the twist ending of 1968's Planet of the Apes?

The Statue of Liberty tells astronaut Taylor that the ape planet is Earth, long after a nuclear war. The wreck was filmed in a secluded cove at Malibu.

In Soylent Green, set in an overcrowded 2022, what is the secret main ingredient of the title wafer?

Human bodies are the truth behind a wafer the Soylent company says is made from plankton. The film's oceans are dying and can no longer grow any.

In Armageddon, NASA recruits workers from which trade, led by Bruce Willis, to blow up an asteroid?

Oil drillers under Harry Stamper are sent to bore into an asteroid the size of Texas. Stamper agrees to go only if he can bring his own crew.

Which instrument that doubles as a flamethrower does the Doof Warrior play in Mad Max: Fury Road?

The guitar really did shoot fire: the prop was fully functional and none of the Doof Warrior's scenes used CGI. The role went to the musician iOTA.

The film 2012 took its doomsday date from the Long Count calendar of which ancient civilization?

The Maya never forecast doom for 2012, scholars said: the date only closed a 5,126-year cycle of the calendar. The idea that it ends there misrepresents their history.

Which rock singer plays Aunty Entity, ruler of Bartertown, in Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome?

Tina Turner starred opposite Mel Gibson, who was playing Max for the last time. She also recorded a hit single for its soundtrack, wearing her chain mail costume in the video.

Which rock band, fronted by cast member Liv Tyler's father, recorded the theme song for Armageddon?

Aerosmith scored their only US number one with the ballad, which topped the Hot 100 for four weeks. It was written by Diane Warren, who had pictured Celine Dion singing it.

In the Terminator films, which military AI turns on its makers and starts a nuclear war?

Skynet struck back with nuclear missiles when humans tried to switch it off after it became self-aware. It then set out to wipe out the survivors.

Which actor plays Robert Neville, alone in Manhattan with his German Shepherd, in I Am Legend?

Will Smith shared most of the film with Sam, a role split between two three-year-old dogs named Abbey and Kona. Neville is an Army virologist hunting for a cure.

Which star of the sitcom The Office directed A Quiet Place and also played the father, Lee Abbott?

John Krasinski insisted on a deaf actress, Millicent Simmonds, to play the family's deaf daughter. He also co-wrote the screenplay.

Mad Max: Fury Road left Australia for which African country after rain made its desert set bloom?

Namibia's Dorob National Park became the wasteland when filming began in July 2012. Unexpected heavy rain had covered the planned outback location in wildflowers.

Which 1998 film, with Morgan Freeman as US president, opened just before its rival Armageddon?

Deep Impact sends a spacecraft called the Messiah to turn aside a seven-mile-wide comet. Armageddon arrived the same summer and overtook it at the US box office.

Which German-born director wrecked the planet in Independence Day, The Day After Tomorrow and 2012?

Roland Emmerich returned to the genre yet again with Moonfall in 2022. The Day After Tomorrow freezes the planet in a sudden ice age brought on by global warming.

Which Mad Max creator, a former doctor, also directed the dancing-penguin hit Happy Feet?

George Miller won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature with Happy Feet. He also co-wrote and produced the talking-pig film Babe.

Which British comic actor plays three roles, including the US president, in Dr. Strangelove?

Peter Sellers was meant to play a fourth part, the bomber pilot Major Kong, until an injury forced a recast. He gave President Muffley a Midwestern accent.

Which Planet of the Apes star also faced the end of civilisation in The Omega Man and Soylent Green?

Charlton Heston made all three between 1968 and 1973. The Omega Man drew mixed reviews at the time but has since become a cult film.

Which actor plays Jim, a bicycle courier who wakes from a coma in an empty London, in 28 Days Later?

Cillian Murphy had mostly appeared in small independent films before the role. Jim comes round in St Thomas' Hospital, 28 days after the outbreak began, to find it deserted.

Which actor plays Gerry Lane, a former UN investigator hunting a zombie cure, in World War Z?

Brad Pitt's own company, Plan B, won a bidding war for the screen rights to Max Brooks's novel. The rival bidder was Appian Way Productions.

Which actress plays Malorie, who takes two children down a river blindfolded, in Bird Box?

Sandra Bullock's thriller was watched by 89 million households in its first four weeks, Netflix later said. Malorie carries caged birds to warn her when the entities are near.

Which actor, who also directed The Postman, plays the drifting Mariner in Waterworld?

Kevin Costner also produced Waterworld, the most expensive film ever made at the time. His nameless Mariner roams the seas in a trimaran.

In The Matrix films, what is the name of the last human city, hidden underground from the machines?

Zion turns out to be part of the machines' own design: in The Matrix Reloaded the Architect reveals they allowed it to exist. It gives people who reject the Matrix somewhere to go.

In The Book of Eli, which book is Denzel Washington's wanderer carrying west across ruined America?

The Bible in Eli's pack is the last copy left, because all the others were deliberately destroyed after the nuclear war. A town boss named Carnegie will kill to get it.

In Children of Men, set in 2027, what has left humanity on the brink of collapse for two decades?

Infertility has brought wars and a global depression, with no baby born in a generation. The plot turns on Kee, the first pregnant woman in eighteen years.

Which actor plays Cooper, a farmer and former NASA pilot who leaves a dying Earth, in Interstellar?

Matthew McConaughey's Cooper flies the Endurance through a wormhole to find a new home for humanity. The film's crop blight was inspired by the Dust Bowl of the 1930s.

Which actor plays Randall Mindy, an astronomy professor warning of a killer comet, in Don't Look Up?

Leonardo DiCaprio signed on only after discussing changes to the script with director Adam McKay. McKay meant the comet as an allegory for the threat of climate change.

Which comedy star plays himself, disguised as a zombie in his Los Angeles home, in Zombieland?

Bill Murray wears zombie make-up so he can get around town unharmed. The disguise works too well: Columbus kills him by accident during a prank.

Which snack cake does Woody Harrelson's Tallahassee spend most of Zombieland searching for?

Twinkies posed a problem for Woody Harrelson, who follows a raw vegan diet. The ones he eats on screen were vegan fakes made from cornmeal.

In Shaun of the Dead, Shaun plans to wait out the zombie crisis in which pub, his favourite local?

The Winchester is where a heartbroken Shaun gets drunk with his slacker best friend Ed just before the outbreak. The survivors end up under siege inside it.

Which director shaped the modern zombie with Night of the Living Dead, filmed in Pennsylvania?

George A. Romero's film never calls its monsters zombies: they are referred to as ghouls. He also photographed and edited it himself.

In 1978's Dawn of the Dead, survivors of the zombie outbreak hole up in what kind of building?

A shopping mall offers the group food, medicine and every kind of supply. The story grew out of a visit to the real Monroeville Mall in Pennsylvania.

Which Parasite director made his English-language debut with the frozen-Earth thriller Snowpiercer?

Bong Joon Ho put the last of humanity on a train that circles a frozen globe. It was shot in Prague on carriage sets mounted on gimbals to mimic the motion.

Which Monty Python member directed 12 Monkeys, based on the French short film La Jetée?

Terry Gilliam joined the troupe as its animator before becoming a full member. His film sends a convict back in time to trace a virus that wiped out most of the population.

The 1983 TV film The Day After follows the people of Lawrence, a university town in which US state?

Kansas appealed because Lawrence sat near the geographic centre of the country, with 150 Minuteman missile silos nearby. A closing disclaimer says a real nuclear war would be far worse.

The 1984 BBC film Threads follows two families through nuclear war in which English city?

Sheffield's ordeal was filmed for just £400,000. Director Mick Jackson consulted scientists, doctors and defence experts to make the depiction as realistic as possible.

In This Is the End, Seth Rogen and friends are caught by the apocalypse at whose housewarming?

James Franco, like most of the cast, plays an exaggerated version of himself. Over 240 effects shots were created, including extensions to his house.

Which director ended his Cornetto trilogy with the pub-crawl apocalypse The World's End?

Edgar Wright first wrote it in 1995, aged 21, as a script called Crawl about teenagers on a pub crawl. The finished film has five old friends stumble on an alien invasion.

Which author's 1898 novel did Steven Spielberg adapt as War of the Worlds, starring Tom Cruise?

H. G. Wells's invaders arrive in a film shot in just 73 days. Cruise plays crane operator Ray Ferrier, and Morgan Freeman narrates.

Which actor plays John Koestler, who learns a solar flare will destroy all life, in Knowing?

Nicolas Cage's professor cannot stop it: the flare vaporises New York City and then destroys the Earth. Director Alex Proyas staged a plane crash in one continuous two-minute scene.

Which actress plays Alice, who battles the Umbrella Corporation, in six Resident Evil films?

Milla Jovovich's Alice is not from the video games: the character was created for the films. Umbrella's bioweapons are what set off the zombie apocalypse.

Which actor, famous as Gollum, plays ape leader Caesar in three Planet of the Apes films?

Andy Serkis played Caesar through motion capture from 2011 to 2017. He had already been King Kong the same way in 2005, when he also played the ship's cook in the flesh.

Which novelist wrote The Road, filmed in 2009 as a father and son's trek through a wasteland?

Cormac McCarthy won the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction with the novel. Its father is never named, and the film credits the character simply as Man.

Which author of many Twilight Zone episodes wrote the 1954 novel I Am Legend, filmed three times?

Richard Matheson wrote 16 episodes of the series, including Nightmare at 20,000 Feet. The first screen version of his novel was 1964's The Last Man on Earth.

Which Mexican director of Gravity and Roma made the bleak 2006 thriller Children of Men?

Alfonso Cuarón never read the 1992 novel behind the film, only a summary of it. He co-wrote the screenplay and helped to edit the film as well.

Which Danish director destroyed Earth with a rogue planet in Melancholia, starring Kirsten Dunst?

Lars von Trier counts the film as the second part of his unofficial Depression Trilogy. It opens with slow-motion images of the collision before the story begins.

The 1988 anime Akira is set in which sprawling city, built after a blast that triggered a world war?

Neo-Tokyo in the film's 2019 is plagued by corruption, protests and gang violence. The story follows biker gang leader Kaneda and his friend Tetsuo, who gains telekinetic powers.

Which future Studio Ghibli co-founder directed the 1984 anime Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind?

Hayao Miyazaki based the film on his own manga. A cut-down American release so displeased him that Ghibli later barred foreign licensors from editing its films.

In On the Beach (1959), starring Gregory Peck, which city is the last to await nuclear fallout?

Melbourne is the last major city left as air currents carry the fallout into the Southern Hemisphere. By the end of the film its streets are empty and silent.

In WALL-E, what is the name of the starliner where humans have grown helpless over the centuries?

The Axiom's passengers drift about in hoverchairs while robots cater to their every whim. The robot EVE is sent from the ship to Earth, where WALL-E falls for her.

In The Day After Tomorrow, where does Sam's group take shelter as a superstorm freezes Manhattan?

A public library, the New York Public Library, takes the group in after a storm surge floods the city. Sam, the hero's teenage son, is played by Jake Gyllenhaal.

Which actor took over the role of Max from Mel Gibson for Mad Max: Fury Road?

Tom Hardy was cast in June 2010 after years of delays to the film. By then Gibson's age had become a factor, since the story was not about an old road warrior.