These films effectuate a convincing sense of dread and hopelessness at the prospect of our demise, leaving us truly shaken and disturbed, yet also somehow grateful to be back in this bright, odd world in which we’re all still alive with possibilities, at least for the time. Ultimately, cinematic apocalypses are most powerful when they can master a certain tone and create an emotional impact. Zombie cinema has become so culturally prevalent (and relevant) that it should rightfully comprise its own ranking likewise, many great films feature world-threatening catastrophes but might not be considered specifically apocalyptic. With global pandemics and the cataclysmic effects of climate change upsetting our daily lives, the end of the world is on our collective minds more than ever, so it only makes sense to catalog the top ten apocalypses in film.Ī brief definition of terms may be important here, considering that there is such a broad array of ways the human race has died out on the silver screen. It only makes sense that the most sensorially stimulating artistic medium, cinema, would embrace the genre as a way to reflect contemporary fears and concerns, dating back to 1916’s aptly titled The End of the World (which itself illuminated worries over the recent Halley’s Comet ). The idea of the apocalypse has always fascinated humanity, testified to by the fact that religions incorporate it into their eschatologies and artists utilize it as a literary device.

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