YMMV / The Quiet Earth

• Adaptation Displacement: The film was released worldwide; for a long time the book was difficult to find even in New Zealand and nearly impossible to lay hands on elsewhere. It was finally reprinted in 2013.
• Alternate Character Interpretation: Two possible explanations for Zac's actions in the ending.
  • 1. Zac realized on his way back to his house that he didn't have time to get the remote control system, because the Depopulation Bomb was going to happen again too early. He took the truck in to try to save Joanne and Api.
  • 2. Zac never intended to get the remote control, and decided to commit suicide by blowing himself up, because he still felt guilty and isolated. He thought Joanne and Api would be better off without him.
  • The other question is if everyone on Earth save those who died at that moment actually vanished, or if just the people who "survived" were the ones who vanished into an alternate universe.
  • We never actually hear Api's full backstory in his own words, we only hear Joanne telling Zac about it. Was she telling the truth, or was she just doing what she said she'd do: finding (or inventing) good in Api's bad actions just because she liked him?
• Awesome Music: The entire score, composed by John Charles and performed by the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra. For a sample, here's "Saturn Rising".
• Fridge Brilliance: Zac's observations about the world around him reveal that universal physical constants, such as the electrical charge of an electron are changing. A different gravitational constant could explain how in the ending Earth and Saturn are so close to each other without catastrophic consequences.
• Nightmare Fuel: Imagine yourself waking up to a perfectly shiny sun and then realising that every single person on Earth has suddenly vanished without a trace. Alternatively, waking up just to discover rising Saturn instead of the sun.
• Retroactive Recognition: The first assistant director is Lee Tamahori, who would direct several Hollywood films in the 1990s.
• Special Effect Failure:
  • While the matte painting in the final scenes is very nicely done, it's kind of obvious where it ends and the actual landscape begins, because you can see the reflection of the sun on the water.
  • The body of Zac's coworker is pretty obviously a dummy.

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