(Younger viewers may not know that in the 1950s this was a widespread belief.) Ripper's nuclear strike, his cigar technique and his concern for his "precious bodily fluids" are so entwined that they inspire unmistakable masturbatory associations. He has become convinced that the commies are poisoning "the purity and essence of our natural fluids" by adding fluoride to the water supply. Ripper (Sterling Hayden) fondling a phallic cigar while launching an unauthorized nuclear strike against Russia. Strangelove'' do not know their hats are funny. But a man who doesn't know he's wearing a funny hat. The laughs have to seem forced on unwilling characters by the logic of events. Strangelove's" humor is generated by a basic comic principle: People trying to be funny are never as funny as people trying to be serious and failing. Yet out of these rudimentary physical props and a brilliant screenplay (which Kubrick and Terry Southern based on a novel by Peter George), Kubrick made what is arguably the best political satire of the century, a film that pulled the rug out from under the Cold War by arguing that if a "nuclear deterrent" destroys all life on Earth, it is hard to say exactly what it has deterred. Ripper, the haywire Air Force general, is just a room with some office furniture in it.
#Noone fights in the warroom movie#
The War Room, one of the most memorable of movie interiors, was created by Ken Adam out of a circular desk, a ring of lights, some back-projected maps, and darkness. His special effects are competent but not dazzling (we are obviously looking at model planes over Russia). Kubrick shot it on four principal locations (an office, the perimeter of an Air Force base, the "War Room," and the interior of a B-52 bomber). Strangelove" (1964) is filled with great comic performances, and just as well, because there's so little else in the movie apart from faces, bodies and words. Kubrick the perfectionist left the unplanned slip in the film, because Scott made it seem convincing, and not an accident.
In another scene, scurrying around the War Room, he slips, falls to a knee, rights himself, and carries on. Scott embodies the body language so completely that it simply plays as drama (and comedy). "He can barrel in that baby so low!" Scott says, with his arms spread wide like wings, and his head shaking in admiration at how good his pilots are-so good one of them is about to bring an end to civilization.Īnother actor, waving his arms around, might look absurd. Buck Turgidson, is informing the president that it is quite likely a B-52 bomber will be able to fly under Russian radar and deliver its payload even though the entire Soviet air force knows where the plane is headed. Consider the scene where his character, Gen. He means what he says so urgently that the expressions accompany his dialogue instead of distracting from it. Yet you don't consciously notice his expressions because Scott sells them with the energy and conviction of his performance. His face here is so plastic and mobile it reminds you of Jerry Lewis or Jim Carrey (in completely different kinds of movies). Scott's facial gymnastics, and yet he endorsed them, and when you watch "Strangelove" you can see why. Billy Wilder once asked Jack Lemmon for "a little less" so many takes in a row that Lemmon finally exploded: "Whaddya want! Nothing?" Lemmon recalls that Wilder raised his eyes to heaven: "Please God!" Kubrick, whose attention to the smallest detail in every frame was obsessive, would have been aware of George C. Directors often ask actors to underplay closer shots, because too much facial movement translates into mugging or overacting.
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