Miracle Mile

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🎬 Miracle Mile (1988)

Welcome back to Bad Dads Film Review! This week we’re taking a trip back to the late ’80s for a cult favourite that defies expectations and genre conventions: Miracle Mile. Written and directed by Steve De Jarnatt, this 1988 thriller starts like a quirky romantic comedy before turning into a full-blown apocalyptic nightmare. It’s a film that asks a terrifying question: what would you do if you knew the world was ending—in 70 minutes?

Harry (Anthony Edwards), a sweet, slightly awkward musician, meets Julie (Mare Winningham) in Los Angeles and sparks fly. They arrange to meet later that night, but fate intervenes when Harry accidentally sleeps through his alarm. Arriving at the diner hours late, he’s met with confusion—until a random call on a payphone changes everything.

The caller, believing he’s reached his father, is panicked: nuclear war is imminent. The U.S. has already launched its missiles and retaliation is on the way. Harry suddenly has the burden of knowing the world may end in just over an hour—and worse still, nobody believes him.

The film unfolds in real-time as Harry tries to find Julie and escape the city, all while chaos slowly blooms around them. The once-quirky atmosphere turns dark, frantic, and despairing, as Los Angeles begins to tear itself apart in anticipation of annihilation.

 Underrated in its time, Miracle Mile has grown a strong cult following thanks to its uncompromising narrative and haunting synth-heavy Tangerine Dream score. It’s one of those films you watch once and can’t quite shake.

Miracle Mile isn’t one for the kids. The growing sense of dread, sudden violence, and bleak ending make it better suited to older teens and adults who can appreciate its boldness and craft. It’s a film about the end of the world—on a very human scale.

It also feels eerily prescient in the age of social media, misinformation, and global anxiety. The panic is contagious, and the idea that everything could fall apart in a matter of minutes hits harder than ever.

A strange, sad, and singular film, Miracle Mile is one of the great what-would-you-do thrillers. It doesn’t offer easy answers or comforting closure, but what it does provide is a uniquely gripping vision of love, fear, and impending doom. A true '80s oddity that’s well worth rediscovering.

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