Post-Apocalyptic Love Triangles: The World, the Flesh and the Devil / The Quiet Earth

Join the UCLA Film & Television Archive in partnership with UCLA Cinema & Media Studies Program for a post-apocalyptic journey as part of their PST ART: Art & Science Collide film series Science Fiction Against the Margins.

A post-apocalyptic Earth is the ideal setting for romantic yearning and rivalry. The World, the Flesh and the Devil (Ranald MacDougall) and The Quiet Earth (Geoff Murphy) each feature a male protagonist (Harry Belafonte, Bruno Lawrence) finding himself in familiar surroundings, but missing a population after living through an environmental catastrophe. Adjusting to the loneliness of their last-man-standing status, these heroes are elated to encounter the second-last person, a beautiful woman. In both films, the novelty of being the only couple creates a euphoria as the pair romp around their respective ghost towns enjoying free rein in deserted department stores and cruising empty streets in abandoned vehicles. Although traffic laws cease to exist, social hierarchies are inflamed when a third survivor appears and a love triangle forms.