The Sun is going dark. It's always night outside. It's getting really cold. Worldwide, society is breaking down and the human race is descending into chaos - except in the Beaty home, where most of the movie takes place. A weird doublethink is going on: At the same time as the family waits for the phone call informing them that they will be picked up to go to some caves that serve as underground shelter, the tyrannical head of the family insists that everything and everyone carry on just as if Snowball Earth isn't imminent. The Sun-going-out thing is just a gimmick to set up this talky, contrived, humorless character study of an extremely dysfunctional family. They're practically boiling over with repressed anger and unresolved conflicts, and you wait for the confrontations, but they never come. You want someone to scream, "Why the hell are we going through this meaningless, futile charade if the world is about to end? Why can't we be real?" But no one does. I don't know whether this film was adapted from a play, but it certainly feels like one, right up to the fake melodrama and scenes that just stop instead of ending. So to end where I began, if you watch this expecting it to be an authentic science-fiction movie, you'll be disappointed - and probably annoyed.
