Thursday, January 2, 2014

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)

Director: Stanley Kubrick

Writers: Stanley Kubrick, Terry Southern, Peter George

Composer: Laurie Johnson

Starring: Peter Sellers, George C. Scott, Sterling Hayden, Keenan Wynn, Slim Pickens, Peter Bull, James Earl Jones, Tracy Reed, Jack Creley, Frank Berry, Robert O'Neil, Glenn Beck, Roy Stephens, Shane Rimmer, Hal Galili, Paul Tamarin, Laurence Herder, Gordon Tanner, John McCarthy, Burnell Tucker

More info: IMDb

Tagline: The hot-line suspense comedy

Plot: An insane general starts a process to nuclear holocaust that a war room of politicians and generals frantically try to stop.



My rating: 10/10

Will I watch it again? YES!

I about lose my shit laughing every time I see this.  George C. Scott gives the funniest performance of his career.  The belly slap is priceless. I'm stunned that he didn't do more comedies.



Peter Sellers does a great job in three roles.  Dr. Strangelove gets some laughs with the physical comedy but I dug his Group Capt. Lionel Mandrake the best as far as his acting goes.  Brilliant performances all around.


Sterling Hayden is a beast of an actor and he's incredibly funny here. He's so serious and slightly over the top.  He's perfect for this character.  Hilarious.


I stand by my notion that Slim Pickens should be in every movie.  Even playing it straight (Kubrick reportedly didn't tell him it was a comedy and only showed him the script for the scenes he was in), he's amazingly funny and he gets the single classic image from the picture.


Keenan Wynn also plays it straight and he gets a lot of laughs.  I love this guy.


The rest of the cast does a wonderful job, too.  Hell, it's got James Earl Jones 14 years before STAR WARS (1977)!  Kubrick was a genius with film.  His casts are spot on, the lighting is incredible, his shot compositions, the sets (Ken Adam of the Bond franchise), editing, music, the works.  This is incredibly funny yet it's a hard-hitting satire of the state of world politics at that time.  50 years later it's still a masterpiece. 



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