The End is Near: 9 Apocalypse Movies to Help You Prepare For Doomsday

Dawn of the Dead (1978)

Word on the street is that those left behind following the rapture will have zombies to contend with, or will become zombies, or are destined to fall to zombies, or something. (Kirk Cameron, will you clear this up for me?) Anyway, just in case a related scenario transpires, here is George Romero's indelible taste of what to expect from the media and your local law enforcement once the apocalypse is underway. Hint: Don't go near the malls!

The Road Warrior (1982)

Director George Miller and star Mel Gibson broke the doomsday genre wide open with their 1979 muscle-car/revenge thriller Mad Max, but this sequel did something even more intriguing by defining a certain post-apocalyptic lifestyle. From Gibson's cocky, brooding wasteland chic to Miller's wide-angle landscapes choked with garbage, cars, smoke and savages, The Road Warrior plays like some kind of aspirational adventure for cynics -- the anti-Indiana Jones, really, for young men coming of age in the last decade of the Cold War.

The Day After (1983)

In the instance that zombies don't spark tomorrow's rapture panic, prepare for a more organic freakout with this TV movie -- the chaotic, hyperrealistic depiction of a nuclear event hitting America, and still pretty harrowing stuff in the long shadow of 9/11. That guy whose car's electrical system fails him, prompting him to sprint desperately away to anywhere -- even though nowhere is safe -- gets me every time.

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