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The War Game
The War Game presents a fictional scenario concerning the consequences of an explosion in Kent following the escalation of an East-West conflict. Here, Watkins continues his experiments in combining fiction and documentary. Through graphs, quotations, and vox pop-style face-to-face interviews with ordinary people, he presents his own research in scientific studies, civil defence documents, and reports on the destruction of Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Dresden, Hamburg, and other cities during the Second World War.
The BBC originally backed the production of the film but later withdrew its support, stating that “the effect of the film is considered too horrific for television broadcast”. The film premiered in cinemas in 1966 and was very well received, but remained unseen on British television until 1985.
The War Game was internationally acclaimed and won several awards, including an Academy Award, remarkably in the Best Documentary category. The film had a significant impact on the growing campaign for nuclear disarmament.
Bio Peter Watkins
English filmmaker and theorist Peter Watkins (1935-2025) was a pioneer of the docudrama and the mockumentary genres, typically with heavy political content. His films present pacifist and radical ideas in a nontraditional style. He mainly focused on mass media and viewers’ relations/participation in movies or television documentaries. In 2004, he also wrote Media Crisis, an engaged essay on the lack of debate about how new forms of audiovisual media are constructed.
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- This film was #78 in the “Greatest” Short Films of All Time 2025