Dr. Stragelove

     There were several things that caught my attention in this film. Colored movies were first seen in 1908. Color TV was introduced to the public in 1954 and in the 1960’s colored TVs was sold in large quantities. So why is it that this movie that was made in 1967 made in black in white instead of color?  I believe that the black and white gives the movie more of an ominous feel. Black and white also seems more serious but since it was a comedy the film did not have to be taken so seriously.

     It took me a while to get the plot of the movie, but a general orders an attack on the Soviet Union. Several different characters try to call off the attack “wing attack plan R” but cannot because the plane is set in a mode where they cannot receive other orders unless the correct three letter prefix is encoded first. This poses to be a problem because unless the B-52 bombers are stopped then this will cause the “doomsday device” to go off and the earth will be dead like the moon. This “doomsday device” has a half life of 93 years and is radioactive.

     I did not really think that this movie was very funny, but after viewing the movie I realized that it was a satire of nuclear warfare.  I was curious about the first nuclear bomb so I did some research. The first nuclear bombing was in 1945. This movie was made in 1967 so it makes sense that the film makers at this time would make a satire.

     One thing that was strange was the pilot. He was a cowboy and a rodeo cowboy at that. Also, one of his crew members was black. I didn’t see any other black people in this film. Also, in every shot with the pilots the song “when Jonny comes marching home” comes on. This set the mood for the pilots being patriotic.

A theme I noticed was gender roles. Again, we see a secretary sleeping with her boss and she is the only one in this film. If you think about it, war is a male dominated activity. There were no women sitting at the round table. There were only men. There were not any women flying the B-52 bombers either. Even the doctor was male.

     Another theme that I noticed was technology and communication. There was radio transmitter, the transmitter in the B-52, and telephone. I guess you could also consider the nuclear bomb technology to in the sense that it took science to figure out how to split the atom. Except for in one scene, every phone conversation was one sided. The audience does not know what the person on the other side of the phone is saying, so how do they know exactly what is going on or some message isn’t being relayed wrong. the secretary answers the phone in one of the first scenes. How does the audience know that she is not miscommunication the message to the general incorrectly? Another example of this is the B-52 bomber plane. Their transmitter becomes damaged so they can’t receive any messages to call off the attack. Communication is huge in everyday life and it is something people have to be careful with. In this case, the world ended up exploding because of miscommunication.