Film Analysis Of Dr. Strangelove By Stanley Kubrick

Dr. Strangelove: Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb was released in the United States in 1964. It received a rating of PG by the Motion Picture Association of America. The film is directed by the renowned British director, Stanley Kubrick. Kubrick uses a mostly American cast, with Peter Sellers, a fellow Brit, playing three characters, including the one after which the film is titled. This is a film that is very formal in structure and execution. The aesthetics are very crisp, sharp, and intention. It is this unyielding commitment to form, grace, and order that makes Dr. Strangelove so hilarious and effective as a war film as well as a satire of war films. Drawing from chapter 9 of Benton's American Cinema, American Culture, the paper demonstrates that Dr. Strangelove conforms to the narrative and structural requirements of American war cinema.

United States Marines are some of the roughest and toughest men to ever walk this Earth, and that is because Marines is not born but instead built, and the men who mold those boys into Marines do a damn good job at doing so. Stanley Kubrick’s portrayal of the United States military and more specifically the Marine Corps, in his 1987 film Full Metal Jacket is arguably unmatched by any other film to date. Full Metal Jacket’s glorification of violence, justified brutality, and superb realism are more accurate than most would like to believe during such a controversial period of American history. From the opening scenes at Marine Corps Recruit Depot (MCRD) Parris Island to the far off, dangerous lands of Vietnam, Full Metal Jacket embodies the

Due to the aforementioned increasing tensions between the two emerging superpowers, an issue of great concern was if, how and when to approach the Soviets with the news of the Manhattan Project. In spite of the differences between the Soviets and the United States, by Truman’s main concern was keeping unity amongst the “Big Three”, realizing that ending the war depended on the support of both Britain and the Soviet Union. The Interim Committee unanimously agreed that Truman should inform of the development of the weapon and our plans to use it against the enemy. They did not advise giving the Soviets specific details of the project, only informing them in order to “enlist Russian cooperation in the set-up of future international controls” of this new technology. Of course, because of the terms of the Quebec Agreement, it would also be necessary to discuss this with Churchill. The continuation of keeping facts from the Soviet Union in spite of the alliance

Though people questioned why acts of war were committed, they found justification in rationalizing that it served the greater good. As time evolved, the world began to evolve in its thinking and view of the atomic bomb and war. In Hiroshima, John Hersey has a conversation with a survivor of the atomic bomb about the general nature of war. “She had firsthand knowledge of the cruelty of the atomic bomb, but she felt that more notice should be given to the causes than to the instruments of total war.” (Hersey, 122). In John Hersey’s book, many concepts are discussed. The most important concept for the reader to identify was how society viewed the use of the bomb. Many people, including survivors, have chosen to look past the bomb itself, into the deeper issues the bomb represents. The same should apply to us. Since WWII, we have set up many restrictions, protocols and preventions in the hope that we could spare our society from total nuclear war. The world has benefited in our perspective of the bomb because we learned, understand, and fear the use of atomic weapons.

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964) is a dark comedy film by Stanley Kubrick. The film deals with nuclear war which was a hot topic during the 50 's and 60 's. Americans were very paranoid about communists and nuclear war at this time. This film shows how ridiculous the paranoia about nuclear war through a sexual relationship allegory. The allegory deals with the masculine and the feminine. The masculine is an important part of the nuclear war efforts while the feminine takes a backseat. The feminine is displayed in men as a negative. The sexual allegory becomes funny through

Dr.Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, a comical satire of the cold war put a humorous twist on some of the then scary realities of the time. From the 1950’s up until about 1990 the U.S. was in a constant state of hostile tension with Russia as each threatened war towards the other with the possibility of nuclear force. It emphasises the themes of paranoia, mutually assured destruction, and stereotyping as a result of propaganda. Paranoia was prevalent during the cold war era. People were constantly terrified for their lives wondering if and when someone was going to make the first strike.

In 1964 with the cold war and Cuban missile crisis still fresh in the minds of many, Stanley Kubrick masterpiece Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb focuses on the terrifying newer technology of the hydrogen bomb and the fear that comes in congruence with having such powerful weaponry. This comes with an oddly comedic twist. Kubrick dared to make a movie about what would happen if the wrong person presses the wrong button. The dark satire throughout the movie is kept fresh with a large array of superb comedy acts throughout.

Stanley Kubrick’s 1964 film Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb presents a satire of the Cold War and nuclear warfare. The film stars comedian Peter Sellers in three different roles, including the president, a Royal Air Force officer, and the title character of Dr. Strangelove—a character who does not play a major role in the action until the final scene of the film. The film itself was adapted by Stanley Kubrick, Peter George, and Terry Southern from George’s thriller novel Red Alert and was originally intended to be a drama, but was made into a satirical black comedy in the writing process (Webster 33). In the final scene, the leaders of the American government are gathered in the War Room awaiting

The historical, monochrome images that flash on the screen, coupled with Motss’ asyndetic list, “Naked girl, covered in napalm. Five marines raising the flag, Mount Suribachl. Churchill, V for Victory” suggests that the public’s understanding of events is often defined by single photographic representations, rather than factual evidence. Followed by Motss’ antithetical, parallel phrases suggest that the understanding individuals gleam from such representations is shallow and fleeting: “You remember the picture, fifty years from now, they'll have forgotten the war” where these images that transpire come to embody and represent the entirety of military events. The imperative “Put the village behind her” and “Gimme some flames”, followed by the blue screen being replaced by a smoking Albanian village, reveals the degree to which the representations upon which the public understand political events may be subject to doctoring and manipulation by the composers in the media. Moments later, Levinson includes film, styled as raw news footage, of a television journalist vouching for the authenticity of the clip to reveal that fabricated representations may appear virtually indistinguishable from the clips shown on mass media. Thus, Levinson reveals the extent to which the public’s understanding of political

Stanley Kubrick’s 1964 film “Dr. Strangelove or: How I learned to Stop Worry and Love the Bomb” and the Cuban Missile Crisis compare in different ways but also contrast each other in certain ways. The film by Stanley Kubrick was filmed in 1964 and was an older comedy film that almost mocks the Cold War fears of a nuclear conflict between the USSR and the United States. The Cuban Missile Crisis was the confrontation in October of 1962 between the United States and the Soviet Union established as a classic foreign policy crisis. Both the article and the film was all done in the 1960’s with the film being produced just in the middle of the Cuban Missile Crisis that was in the years of 1961-1963. Peoples thoughts today are all over the board on whether or not countries should be allowed to have nuclear weapons and if they can be trusted with them. Information about this all will be included in this paper.

Stanley Kubrick is infamous for his witty films that satire governmental and societal actions though history. In this film, Dr. Strangelove, Or: How I learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964), Kubrick is once again directing a film that is a biting, sardonic comedy that pokes fun at the nuclear fears of the 1950s. The screenplay for the movie was written by Stanley Kubrick and Terry Southern, and was based on the novel Red Alert written by Peter George. In this film, which is classified as a black comedy/fantasy, technology runs amok and takes over society and mankind. The irony of the situation, however, became apparent when shortly after

“Dr.Strangelove” is an 1964 film based on the argument of rational; deterrence theory by Kenneth Waltz. Many of the events that occurred during the film also complimented many of the critiques of rational deterrence theory later made by Scott Sagan. Nuclear weapons have been an important issue for debate for years. The spotlight of nuclear weapons was an important factor during the cold war nevertheless the question of nuclear weapons remains afterwards. The question of both the spread and contraction of nuclear weapons remains a strong issue because of the opposing theories that argue against the question of the spread, contraction furthermore the total dissolution of nuclear weapons.

The previously accepted nature of war stemmed from the Clausewitzian trinity: war is emotional, an experience wrought with passion, violence, and enmity; uncertainty, chance, and friction pervade the medium of war; however, because war is not an end in itself, and because, as a means, it is subordinate to its political aims, war must be subject to reason (Clausewitz, 89). With the first employment of nuclear weapons, however, strategists and military theorists began to question Clausewitz’s foundational ideas (Winkler, 58). Similarly, Allan Winkler, in agreeing with Bernard Brodie’s thesis, opines that the advent of nuclear weapons fundamentally changed the nature of war. Winkler’s assertion stems from his argument that such a nuclear duel would yield a post-war environment incapable of recovery for any parties involved (62). He further describes Brodie’s realization that “[t]he atomic bomb is not just another and more destructive weapon to be added to an already long list. It is something which threatens to make the rest of the list relatively unimportant.” (62) Ultimately, Winkler abridges Brodie’s assessment in stating that “the United States was caught in the paradox of having to prepare for a war it did not plan to fight.” (63)

The film “The Prestige” is one of many masterful Nolan films that walks the line between being a meta film about the film industry, and being focused on immersing the audience in the actual content of the film. At a close inspection, comparisons to the film industry can be seen, but they are not so obvious to distract the audience from the central conflicts that are at the forefront of the film. The subject of the film could most easily be defined as surrounding the topics of obsession or fame. More specifically, the obsession of fame, and the illusion of happiness that fame projects. The main characters of the movie both urn for the fame of being the world’s most successful entertainer, even if for different reasons.

Before the Psycho by Alfred Hitchcock made its way into theaters across the world, film was produced in a completely different way. Some of the elements that were in Psycho were things that nobody saw in movies before. According to Entertainment Weekly’s Owen Gleiberman, when the movie came out, it took place in “an atmosphere of dark and stifling ‘50s conformity” and that the elements of the film “tore through the repressive ‘50s blandness just a potently as Elvis had.” (Hudson). Alfred Hitchcock changed the way that cinema was made by breaking away from the old, “safe” way of creating a movie and decided to throw all of the unwritten rules of film making out the window. The main ways he accomplished this task was by adding graphic violence, sexuality, and different ways to view the film differently than any other movie before its time.