Double Feature Review

Posted by J.R. Fanchalsky on Feb 3rd 2024

This review comes under the title of "Dr. Strangelove," but I am double-billing it with another film I purchased at the same time because the two of them make one of the finest double features you can spend an evening watching. Although "Dr. Strangelove" was the first to be filmed and released in January 1964, the partner film, "Fail Safe," released in October 1964, should be viewed first just to understand that "Dr. Strangelove" is not a mockery of "Fail Safe."
"Fail Safe" first appeared as a novel by John Harvey Wheeler and Eugene Burdick in 1962. The film adaptation by director Sidney Lumet is noteworthy for its faithfulness to the novel's plot line which well-captured the Cold War tensions of the day. Seeing the interworking of so many story elements contributing to this tension visually--the president's personal involvement in the White House, the conflict between aggressiveness and restraint inside the Pentagon, the military command center trying to control its technical capabilities, and procedures inside a nuclear-armed bomber aircraft--make for a film of mature action that does not have one lax moment. Fail safe itself is a term that denotes strict procedures that will not allow airborne nuclear bombers to proceed beyond a point that would commit them to attack an assigned target. The action plays out the decisions that would have to be made if a breakdown in communications disrupted the fail safe feature of such an airborne mission. If you do not already know this story, you will be shocked at what the consequences would be.
"Dr. Strangelove" came about when director Stanley Kubrick initially intended to make a serious film based on a similar novel from 1958 titled "Red Alert" by Peter George. Having read several books, fiction and non-fiction, about possible catastrophic procedural and technical failures involving Cold War activities, Kubrick became conscious of the absurdity of the Cold War mind set of both the American and Russian camps. The decision was thus made to satirize the situation in an unbelievably hilarious send up. The helpless tragedies of "Fail Safe" are completely turned on their heads in "Dr. Strangelove." In addition to the action of such a film not being in the least cheaply portrayed, the acting is also to be commended. In particular, this film is a tour de force for British actor Peter Sellers, best known as Inspector Clouseau in the "Pink Panther" series of films. Sellers takes on three roles in this film, namely, Group Captain Lionel Mandrake, the RAF exchange officer, US President Murkin Muffley, and Dr. Strangelove himself. He portrays three completely different characters such that no viewer can see any similarity in acting style, voice, manner, or technique. This display of talent alone makes the film worth watching.
If you collect films for any reason, these two belong together for both notable similarity and contrast. Don't get one without the other or you'll be cheating yourself out of a highly enjoyable entertainment experience.