Dean Stockwell co-directed the film and acted along with Russ Tamblyn, Dennis Hopper, and the band Devo.

[2] Employees and customers spend time at a small gas station-diner in a fictional town next to a nuclear power plant unaware it is the last day on Earth.

His employee, Lionel Switch, is the garage's goofy and bumbling auto mechanic who dreams of being a rock star.

After some modest character development and a collage-like dream sequence there is a tongue-in-cheek choreographed musical finale while nuclear war begins.

At the destroyed gas station-diner post nuclear holocaust, Booji Boy is the lone survivor, but after his cynical prose[3] the opening credits are a return to present time prior to apocalypse.

She sits down weeping at a booth that has a picture on the wall of Old Otto and chooses on the juke box the song "The End of the World".

Later, waitress Irene, overhears Young Otto's plans to fire everybody, destroy the buildings and collect on a fraud insurance claim.

After meeting rock star Frankie, who appears to lead an opulent, sequestered and drug influenced life-style, Lionel says to the wooden Indian in his shop, "Now there's a real human being!"

Lionel travels with his band (the wooden Indians) and crew (all people from his waking life) by trucks through the desert.

The planet is engulfed in radioactive glow and the cast, still festive, climbs a stairway to heaven accompanied by harp music.

The cast in credit order includes Neil Young as "Lionel Switch", the garage mechanic; Russ Tamblyn as "Fred Kelly" who is Lionel's friend; Dean Stockwell as "Otto Quartz", the restaurant and gas station owner; and Dennis Hopper as the cook, "Cracker".

The film was released shortly after the death of 1960s folk-singer David Blue who was cast as the milkman, "Earl Duke".

Gerald Casale said the band felt removed observing the odd behaviors including excessive alcohol and drug abuse, and rock star adulation with Young as the central "most grounded" person.

The screen play is credited to Bernard Shakey, Jeanne Field, Dean Stockwell, Russ Tamblyn, and Beshears.

[9] The film's score was the first by Mark Mothersbaugh (Rugrats, Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist, Herbie: Fully Loaded, Rushmore, The Royal Tenenbaums, The Lego Movie), who also portrays Booji Boy and a nuclear garbage man.

[12] Following the film's official premiere in Los Angeles, June 1983, it was shown only briefly in a small number of theaters.

[12] After the film's release to VHS in 1996 it has since received more favorable reviews such as being described by TV Guide as "goofy and enjoyable" and Young's acting as "surprisingly funny."

[2] The film was released in a VHS fullscreen edition (as well as LaserDisc) by WEA in 1995, twelve years after its initial screening.