Dr Strangelove to screen on Monday 10/22

"Dr Strangelove" will be playing on Monday night, October 22nd
at 7 p.m. @IFS/Muenzinger Auditorium

The Doctor came to the silver screen for the first time in 1964 when i was just 11. Living in a very small town with a mother who only let us go to Disney movies (and, okay, forced us to accompany her to Charleton Heston movies like "Ben Hur," "El Cid," and "The Ten Commandments"--so my repulsion for Mr. Big Guns began very early). Even if "Doctor Strangelove" did play The Barstow Theater, I certainly wouldn't have been in the audience...nor would i have gotten much of what was going on. I don't think many of the residents of any age would have--except, that is, the parts where Slim Pickens as the man with the biggest gun in the universe is on screen!



 My first viewing was about 10 years later when Los Angeles was at the height of the revival theater craze that swept the U.S. in the '70s. It was on a double bill with "The Killing," a great early Kubrick from 1956. I was blown away, and thrilled by how the director could make two such totally different but perfect films. Likely the only Kubrick films I'd seen were "Spartacus" on TV, and "A Clockwork Orange" in the theater. Both contained unforgettable scenes, and were totally divergent as well.

"Dr Strangelove" is Kubrick's only full-out comedy though "Lolita" has some of the same satire on display.

The plot of "Dr. Strangelove" goes like this: At Burpleson Air Force Base, where a huge sign declares, "Peace Is Our Profession," General Jack D. Ripper (Sterling Hayden), has initiated a nuclear strike against the "Ruskies", who he is convinced are already involved in a full-fledged assault on "our precious bodily fluids" through fluoridation of the water supply. How does he know?? He's become impotent, that's  how! This character is said to be modeled on General Curtis LeMay, who masterminded U.S. bombings in WWII along with Robert McNamara. In Erroll Morris' brilliant "The Fog of War," McNamara mused that "If we'd lost the war, LeMay and I would have been tried for war crimes, but the victors write history." So true.

Ripper, who has shut down all communication in and out of the base, informs RAF Colonel Lionel Mandrake (the first of Peter Sellers's fabulous character creations in the film) of his actions, and Mandrake is agog, hardly believing that this could happen, and is sure that if he could get word to the outside, he could avert this calamity. He thinks he knows the recall code. But making contact is impossible with the insane General Ripper around. Meanwhile, Mandrake is trying to get a Coke out of the machine to calm his nerves, but the machine won't work. When he becomes so frustrated that he assaults the machine, he's informed by U.S. Colonel Bat Guano (Keenan Wynn) that "you'll have to answer to the Coca Cola Company for that,"--a poke at nascent Corporate dominance in the U.S. "Dr Strangelove" is chock full of these hilarious juxtapositions of the serious and the totally mundane occurring on the day the world may end.

The order to bomb the U.S.S.R. goes straight to the B-52 Bomber Squadron commanded by Major T.J. "King" Kong, played by Slim Pickens. His main bombardier is Lt. Lothar Zogg (James Earl Jones in his first film role), and they can hardly believe that what they expected never to occur has come to pass. And it's damned exciting!! "We're in a shooting war with the Ruskies!" Kong excitedly declares...I mean what are all these damn bombs for?!@#$*  Not sure they have enough fuel to achieve the target as outlined in the orders, Pickens is working on his own agenda of deploying his bomb wherever he can on enemy soil if he can't make it all the way.

However, once the orders go to the plane, President Merkin Muffley (a doubly vaginal name--and the second of Sellers's star turns) and his Pentagon War Room are quickly assembled. Key among the players here are General Buck Turgidson (George C. Scott) and Dr. Strangelove, (Sellers yet again), a former Nazi scientist standing in here for Werner von Braun. This is the scientist behind the hydrogen bomb that now threatens the existence of the planet, and he's really kind of delighted to see his "baby" come into play. Muffley also decides to invite the Russian ambassador, de Sadesky in to help work through what to do next. Together they piece together the "back-door" method that Ripper has used to launch the attack on Russia--something the president alone was supposed to be able to do. They all agree that it's time for Muffley to call the Soviet premier, Dimitri Kisov. Their conversation is as follows:  "Hello, Dimitri....I'm fine....Now then, you know how we've always talked about the possibility of something going wrong with the bomb....The bomb, Dimitri. The hydrogen bomb....Well, now, what happened is that, uh, one of our base commanders...he went a little funny in the head....and he went and did a silly thing....He ordered his planes to attack your country."

A comedy about an accidental nuclear attack? That's what i'm talkin' about!! If anything, in a world full of so many more bombs than there were in 1964, this crazy creation will still make you simultaneously laugh uncontrollably, and cry--for more than one reason. Don't miss the chance to see this classic on the big screen.