It is a normal day for the Wetherly family, as the father (William Devane) is off at work, their daughter is at school, and the mother (Jane Alexander) is at home watching their youngest, who is happily watching Sesame Street when the signal is lost and a blinding white light encompasses their entire field of vision, the result of a nuclear bomb having touchdowned in the nearby metropolis. Now with the father completely off the grid, the mother must face the increasingly dire effects of nuclear fallout and shelter her family while guiding them to what will certainly be a doomed fate. Testament is a realistic drama, miles away from the mind numbing disaster films viewers of today have grown accustomed to. While offering a likely, horrific scenario, the film lays in on awfully thick thick with a pretentious screenplay and a severely misguided performance from Alexander, who did receive an Academy Award nomination for her work.
