History Fridge / WhenTheWindBlows

*** [[spoiler: There's a brief scene that shows they live in Clayton, which is very close to Leeds. Leeds itself was a city that produced munitions during WW2, and due to its manufacturing usage would have been one of the cities targeted in a nuclear war scenario.]]

*** Wasn't Ron in central London, where a bomb hit? If you're in the middle of where the nuke lands, it is, indeed, absolutely pointless doing anything except accepting your fate.

* Roger Waters did the music for the film and he wanted to have his music all the way through (he wasn't the only one: Music/{{Squeeze}} and Music/{{Genesis|Band}} really wanted to contribute music and turn the whole thing into a pop musical) but the filmmakers said no. After the nuclear attack, there is no music at all until the film ends.

* Briggs' earlier book ''Gentleman Jim'' offers a reason for Jim's completely supine approach to officialdom, establishing him as an unusually pure example of a FailureHero. Jim, bored with his job is a lavatory attendant, decides that he wants a better job, and after going through various options which are hopelessly unrealistic for a poorly-educated middle-aged man, decides to become a [[TheHighwayman highwayman]] who will rob from the rich and give to the poor. This involves getting a horse, a costume, a sword and a gun, none of which he is able to obtain, so he makes do with a donkey, improvises a costume from a curtain, a pair of Wellington boots, one of Hilda's old blouses and a modified ARP helmet, and uses toy weapons. All along the line, however, he comes up against authority and ends up being arrested and sent to jail. It's clear at the end of the book that he quite likes it in jail, because he no longer has to make any decisions for himself. If Jim learns anything from this, it's that he's always in the wrong with respect to authority. Which doesn't help him and Hilda at all when the authorities declare a nuclear war.

* Briggs' earlier book ''Gentleman Jim'' offers a reason for Jim's completely supine approach to officialdom, establishing him as an unusually pure example of a FailureHero. Jim bored with his job is a lavatory attendant, decides that he wants a better job, and after going through various options which are hopelessly unrealistic for a poorly-educated middle-aged man, decides to become a [[TheHighwayman highwayman]] who will rob from the rich and give to the poor. This involves getting a horse, a costume, a sword and a gun, none of which he is able to obtain, so he makes do with a donkey, improvises a costume from a curtain, a pair of Wellington boots, one of Hilda's old blouses and a modified ARP helmet, and uses toy weapons. All along the line, however, he comes up against authority, and ends up being arrested and sent to jail. It's clear at the end of the book that he quite likes it in jail, because he no longer has to make any decisions for himself. If Jim learns anything from this, it's that he's always in the wrong with respect to authority. Which doesn't help him and Hilda at all when the authorities declare a nuclear war.

* Bloggs' earlier book ''Gentleman Jim'' offers a reason for Jim's completely supine approach to officialdom, establishing him as an unusually pure example of a FailureHero. In it, we see that Jim's job is a lavatory attendant. Bored of being this, he decides that he wants a better job, and after going through various options which are hopelessly unrealistic for a poorly-educated middle-aged man, (including "Exec-tive", because executives drive cars where the "gear stick is always in a little leather bag" and Jim would love to be able to drive a car, "even without the little leather bag"), he decides to become a [[TheHighwayman highwayman]] who will rob from the rich and give to the poor. This involves getting a horse, a costume, a sword and a gun. Jim can't afford a horse, a proper costume and is unable to obtain a real sword or gun, so he makes do with a donkey; a costume adapted from a curtain, a pair of Wellington boots, one of Hilda's old blouses and a modified ARP helmet; a plastic toy sword wrapped in tinfoil, and a toy pistol that fires rubber sucker darts. All along the line, however, he comes up against authority: a park keeper won't let him graze the donkey on parkland, and in a case of StrawmanHasAPoint, an RSPCA inspector insists that the donkey must be properly housed and fed and not just tethered in Jim and Hilda's front garden (although this means that Jim has to spend a lot of money on building materials and food, which he can't really afford.) When at last he's ready, he goes out on the public highway and is immediately arrested, the police putting the worst possible construction on his getup (e.g., Jim's toy sword wrapped in tinfoil is described as 'a nine inch rubber cosh sheathed in metal', etc.) and he's sent to jail. Oddly enough, it's clear at the end of the book that he quite likes it in jail, because he no longer has to make any decisions for himself. If Jim learns anything from this, it's that he's always in the wrong with respect to authority. Which doesn't help him and Hilda at all when the authorities declare a nuclear war.

* Roger Waters did the music for the film and he wanted to have his music all the way through (he wasn't the only one: Music/{{Squeeze}} and Music/{{Genesis}} really wanted to contribute music and turn the whole thing into a pop musical) but the filmmakers said no. After the nuclear attack, there is no music at all until the film ends.

...wait, there's more to get than [[UsefulNotes/NuclearWeapons 'nuclear]] [[WorldWarIII war]] is a [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt bad idea']]?

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* When the nuke hits in the middle of the movie, a montage of the Bloggs' lives plays until their wedding photo breaks...it's basically a ReallyDeadMontage. Jim and Hilda are at this point for all intents and purposes dead; the radiation has the indecency to force them to linger.
* Eventually, later in the film, Jim realizes what`s really going on, at least to a degree; Jim's bumbling about is actually him trying to hide the fact that they're both dying of radiation poisoning. Near the end of the film, Hilda finds out too, hence why she suggests they get into the paper bags again, and pray.

* Soon after the blast, rain begins to fall, and the couple stand out in it, relishing in the coolness and collecting some rain water to drink. This is very likely what is called rain out, which in respect to radioactive fallout, acts like a natural sponge to the fallout in the atmosphere; in a nutshell, it collects the radioactive particles from the air in the form of rain, cleansing the air, but further polluting the ground by having it soaked with what is basically concentrated concentrated nuclear fallout. And the Bloggses are rubbing themselves with the water and drinking it. No wonder they began deteriorating so quickly.

* Soon after the blast, rain begins to fall, and the couple stand out in it, relishing in the coolness and collecting some rain water to drink. This is very likely what is called rain out, which in respect to radioactive fallout, acts like a natural sponge to the fallout in the atmosphere; in a nutshell, it collects the radioactive particles from the air in the form of rain, cleansing the air, but further polluting the ground by having it soaked with what is basically concentrated concentrated nuclear fallout. And the Bloggses are rubbing themselves with the water and _drinking_ it. No wonder they began deteriorating so quickly.

[[AC: FridgeBrilliance]]

* Ron, the Bloggs' son, is kind of a jerkass, regardless of "nerves". He sings to his father "[[Music/TomLehrer We'll all go together when we go]]" over the phone. He ''laughs'' at his father for being responsible. Imminent death is looming over him and his loved ones, he has a child to worry about, ''and he isn't doing a damn thing about it''. At least his parents had the decency to try and help their situation. Worse, it's implied he's an alcoholic. At ''best'', he'll be dead. At worst, [[FateWorseThanDeath he'll have just enough time to realize that he treated the event that killed his entire family like a joke just before suffering the same fate.]] Take deadly situations seriously. How's that for a FamilyUnfriendlyAesop?

* Bloggs' earlier book ''Gentleman Jim'' offers a reason for Jim's completely supine approach to officialdom, establishing him as an unusually pure example of a FailureHero. In it, we see that Jim's job is a lavatory attendant. Bored of being this, he decides that he wants a better job, and after going through various options which are hopelessly unrealistic for a poorly-educated middle-aged man, (including "Exec-tive", because executives drive cars where the "gear stick is always in a little leather bag" and Jim would love to be able to drive a car, "even without the little leather bag"), he decides to become a [[TheHighwayman highwayman]] who will rob from the rich and give to the poor. This involves getting a horse, a costume, a sword and a gun. Jim can't afford a horse, a proper costume and is unable to obtain a real sword or gun, so he makes do with a donkey; a costume adapted from a curtain, a pair of Wellington boots, one of Ethel's old blouses and a modified ARP helmet; a plastic toy sword wrapped in tinfoil, and a toy pistol that fires rubber sucker darts. All along the line, however, he comes up against authority: a park keeper won't let him graze the donkey on parkland, and in a case of StrawmanHasAPoint, an RSPCA inspector insists that the donkey must be properly housed and fed and not just tethered in Jim and Ethel's front garden (although this means that Jim has to spend a lot of money on building materials and food, which he can't really afford.) When at last he's ready, he goes out on the public highway and is immediately arrested, the police putting the worst possible construction on his getup (e.g., Jim's toy sword wrapped in tinfoil is described as 'a nine inch rubber cosh sheathed in metal', etc.) and he's sent to jail. Oddly enough, it's clear at the end of the book that he quite likes it in jail, because he no longer has to make any decisions for himself. If Jim learns anything from this, it's that he's always in the wrong with respect to authority. Which doesn't help him and Ethel at all when the authorities declare a nuclear war.

* Ron, the Bloggs' son, is kind of a jerkass, regardless of "nerves". He sings to his father "We'll all go together when we go" over the phone. He ''laughs'' at his father for being responsible. Imminent death is looming over him and his loved ones, he has a child to worry about, ''and he isn't doing a damn thing about it''. At least his parents had the decency to try and help their situation. Worse, it's implied he's an alcoholic. At ''best'', he'll be dead. At worst, [[FateWorseThanDeath he'll have just enough time to realize that he treated the event that killed his entire family like a joke just before suffering the same fate.]] Take deadly situations seriously. How's that for a FamilyUnfriendlyAesop?

* I had just realized, later in the film, eventually Jim realizes what`s really going on, at least to a degree; Jim's bumbling about is actually him trying to hide the fact that they're both dying of radiation poisoning. Near the end of the film, Hilda finds out too, hence why she suggests they get into the paper bags again, and pray.

* When the nuke hits in the middle of the movie, a montage of the Bloggs' lives plays until their wedding photo breaks...it's basically a ReallyDeadMontage. Jim and Hilda are this point for all intents and purposes dead; the radiation has the indecency to force them to linger.

* In ''When The Wind Blows'', Jim Bloggs repeatedly says, "Ours is not to reason why", but never remembers the next line -- and then, at the end, says "...rode the Six Hundred...", for the line is from Tennyson's "[[ForegoneConclusion The Charge of the Light Brigade]]":