Although the Cold War has been over for more than thirty years, Stanley Kubrick's DR STRANGELOVE, OR HOW I LEARNED TO STOP WORRYING AND LOVE THE BOMB never ceases to be relevant. Kubrick made this masterpiece at a time when tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union were at an all-time high, with recent memories of the Berlin Wall's construction, the Cuban Missile Crisis, and the worsening situation in Vietnam. DR STRANGELOVE has been analyzed and written about almost to death since its release in 1964. Even the adjective Strangeloveian has been appropriated in numerous political articles and essays.
Long concerned about the possibility of nuclear confrontation, Kubrick believed that a truly great motion picture could be harvested from that nightmarish scenario. He pondered several stories concerning thermonuclear war before coming across the book "Red Alert" by Peter George. Kubrick quickly bought the rights and then proceeded to work on a screenplay with the author.
Originally intended as a serious drama, the project began to take on comedic proportions during one marathon brainstorming session. Mentally exhausted, Kubrick and George's mood took on overtones of silliness, and that's when DR STRANGELOVE evolved from its deadly serious significance to that of a comedy, albeit a dark one. To help out with the satire, they brought on bohemian essayist Terry Southern, whose iconoclastic brand of humor would smooth out the script's rougher edges.
Kubrick already worked with Peter Sellers on LOLITA and was highly impressed with the chameleonic actor's comic timing and improvisational skills. Although Sellers played three different roles in STRANGELOVE ~the U. S. President, a Royal Air Force captain, and the title character~ Kubrick wanted him to take on at least one more. Sellers managed to master the Texas drawl of Air Force Major Kong, but just before he was due to shoot his scenes inside the B-52 cockpit, he broke his leg. Slim Pickens was brought in to replace him.
DR STRANGELOVE opens at Burlpelson Air Force base, commanded by the amusingly named General Jack D Ripper 😆. Executive officer Captain Lionel Mandrake is contacted by his boss, who informs him that the base is to be put on red alert immediately. Apparently, the Russians have begun launching an attack on the United States, which will require a retaliatory response from the airborne planes already flying over the Arctic. Ripper orders Mandrake to issue the attack codes to the aircraft, followed by the standard procedure of sealing off Burlpelson.
Meanwhile, in Washington DC, General Buck Turgidson (George C Scott), the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, is in the process of doing something....uh, personal when he receives a call from an aide, alerting him about Ripper's actions. Turgidson convenes an emergency meeting at the Pentagon war room to inform the President about Ripper's impending military strikes against the Russians.
Back at Burlpelson, Mandrake becomes increasingly aware that something is amiss. Putting two and two together, he's now convinced that the Soviet Union is not attacking America after all. It's only after taking his suspicions to Ripper that he realizes his fanatically anti-communist boss ordered the strike on his own hardline volition. And this madman is the only person who knows the three letter recall code!!!!
There are many memorable moments in DR STRANGELOVE, but my personal favorite is the the hotline conversation where the President is about to inform the Soviet Premier of the rogue general's actions. "Well, what happened is, one of our base commanders had a sort of....well, he went a little funny in the head. You know, just a little....funny. And he went and did a silly thing. Well, I'll tell you. He ordered his planes....to attack your country ". Sellers reportedly improvised much of that monologue with the perfectionist director's enthusiastic approval.
It's not all dark laughs however. There's a serious military confrontation between Ripper's men and the troops ordered by the President to seize Burlpelson and take the general into custody. As bullets are whizzing around and destroying his office, Ripper casually rambles on about Communist plots to "sap and impurify all of our precious bodily fluids", while Mandrake desperately tries to pry the recall code from his mad boss
When I first saw DR STRANGELOVE in the Eighties, I thought it was somewhat farcical, particularly the scene with Ripper's water flouridation monologue. I only discovered much later about these John Birch Society types in America's non-intellectual elite that actually fell for those farfetched conspiracy theories. Alex Jones would certainly have fitted in. These people were so far to the right they believed Eisenhower was a communist sympathizer. Kubrick was obviously well informed and well read on the politics of the day.
People watching DR STRANGELOVE for the first time should be cautioned that it's nowhere in the same comedic vein as Sellers' Pink Panther movies. They're likely to go in with preconceived slapstick notions and then become disappointed with the final result. The best advice I can offer is to watch DR STRANGELOVE from a dramatically serious viewpoint, as you would with FAIL SAFE....and then allow the darkly comic moments to unfold organically.
Sellers gives his greatest performance (s) in the multiple roles, especially as the creepy Strangelove, an ex-Nazi scientist and architect of the Doomsday machine. Scott is his match as Turgidson, a general nearly as unhinged as Ripper.
A special tip of the hat should be gestured to the work done by production designer Ken Adam. In addition to the splendid layout of the war room, Adam found the construction of the B-52 cockpit just as challenging. With no clear idea of what the interior of a modern fighter plane looked like, and no cooperation forthcoming from the U. S. Air Force, Adam had to rely on his imagination....and a partial photograph inside a book jacket. He later recalled that Air Force officials were invited to the STRANGELOVE set in England, and their ashen reaction to his design indicated that Adam's recreation was spot on.
Like good wine, there's just a handful of movies that improve with age. DR STRANGELOVE is one of them. 🔚
Long concerned about the possibility of nuclear confrontation, Kubrick believed that a truly great motion picture could be harvested from that nightmarish scenario. He pondered several stories concerning thermonuclear war before coming across the book "Red Alert" by Peter George. Kubrick quickly bought the rights and then proceeded to work on a screenplay with the author.
Originally intended as a serious drama, the project began to take on comedic proportions during one marathon brainstorming session. Mentally exhausted, Kubrick and George's mood took on overtones of silliness, and that's when DR STRANGELOVE evolved from its deadly serious significance to that of a comedy, albeit a dark one. To help out with the satire, they brought on bohemian essayist Terry Southern, whose iconoclastic brand of humor would smooth out the script's rougher edges.
Kubrick already worked with Peter Sellers on LOLITA and was highly impressed with the chameleonic actor's comic timing and improvisational skills. Although Sellers played three different roles in STRANGELOVE ~the U. S. President, a Royal Air Force captain, and the title character~ Kubrick wanted him to take on at least one more. Sellers managed to master the Texas drawl of Air Force Major Kong, but just before he was due to shoot his scenes inside the B-52 cockpit, he broke his leg. Slim Pickens was brought in to replace him.
DR STRANGELOVE opens at Burlpelson Air Force base, commanded by the amusingly named General Jack D Ripper 😆. Executive officer Captain Lionel Mandrake is contacted by his boss, who informs him that the base is to be put on red alert immediately. Apparently, the Russians have begun launching an attack on the United States, which will require a retaliatory response from the airborne planes already flying over the Arctic. Ripper orders Mandrake to issue the attack codes to the aircraft, followed by the standard procedure of sealing off Burlpelson.
Meanwhile, in Washington DC, General Buck Turgidson (George C Scott), the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, is in the process of doing something....uh, personal when he receives a call from an aide, alerting him about Ripper's actions. Turgidson convenes an emergency meeting at the Pentagon war room to inform the President about Ripper's impending military strikes against the Russians.
Back at Burlpelson, Mandrake becomes increasingly aware that something is amiss. Putting two and two together, he's now convinced that the Soviet Union is not attacking America after all. It's only after taking his suspicions to Ripper that he realizes his fanatically anti-communist boss ordered the strike on his own hardline volition. And this madman is the only person who knows the three letter recall code!!!!
There are many memorable moments in DR STRANGELOVE, but my personal favorite is the the hotline conversation where the President is about to inform the Soviet Premier of the rogue general's actions. "Well, what happened is, one of our base commanders had a sort of....well, he went a little funny in the head. You know, just a little....funny. And he went and did a silly thing. Well, I'll tell you. He ordered his planes....to attack your country ". Sellers reportedly improvised much of that monologue with the perfectionist director's enthusiastic approval.
It's not all dark laughs however. There's a serious military confrontation between Ripper's men and the troops ordered by the President to seize Burlpelson and take the general into custody. As bullets are whizzing around and destroying his office, Ripper casually rambles on about Communist plots to "sap and impurify all of our precious bodily fluids", while Mandrake desperately tries to pry the recall code from his mad boss
When I first saw DR STRANGELOVE in the Eighties, I thought it was somewhat farcical, particularly the scene with Ripper's water flouridation monologue. I only discovered much later about these John Birch Society types in America's non-intellectual elite that actually fell for those farfetched conspiracy theories. Alex Jones would certainly have fitted in. These people were so far to the right they believed Eisenhower was a communist sympathizer. Kubrick was obviously well informed and well read on the politics of the day.
People watching DR STRANGELOVE for the first time should be cautioned that it's nowhere in the same comedic vein as Sellers' Pink Panther movies. They're likely to go in with preconceived slapstick notions and then become disappointed with the final result. The best advice I can offer is to watch DR STRANGELOVE from a dramatically serious viewpoint, as you would with FAIL SAFE....and then allow the darkly comic moments to unfold organically.
Sellers gives his greatest performance (s) in the multiple roles, especially as the creepy Strangelove, an ex-Nazi scientist and architect of the Doomsday machine. Scott is his match as Turgidson, a general nearly as unhinged as Ripper.
A special tip of the hat should be gestured to the work done by production designer Ken Adam. In addition to the splendid layout of the war room, Adam found the construction of the B-52 cockpit just as challenging. With no clear idea of what the interior of a modern fighter plane looked like, and no cooperation forthcoming from the U. S. Air Force, Adam had to rely on his imagination....and a partial photograph inside a book jacket. He later recalled that Air Force officials were invited to the STRANGELOVE set in England, and their ashen reaction to his design indicated that Adam's recreation was spot on.
Like good wine, there's just a handful of movies that improve with age. DR STRANGELOVE is one of them. 🔚