Black humour, I’ve learned, truly is the way to my heart. I stopped worrying and learned to love this film immediately. Kubrick masters the art of black humour in Dr Strangelove, casting a satirical eye over the shortcomings of modern man, making this film one of the most potent pieces of reflective cinema in history. Nazism, racism, eugenics, nuclear warfare, anti-communist conspiracy, propagandistic brainwashing, bureaucratic corruption, insanity and the apocalypse: all heavy, heavy issues. Kubrick brings these behemoths to their knees with his timely execution of irony, satire and the inappropriate joke.
“Life is a comedy to those that think; a tragedy to those that feel.” Horace Walpole
Black humour is about subverting the darkest of issues with a treatment of comedy. When you think about life, it is hilarious. It is the divine comedy. Whenever you’re reflecting on something tragic that’s happened in your own life, there’s always that tiny part of your brain dying to make the most unsavoury of jokes. That part of your brain is called Stanley Kubrick. In Dr Strangelove, Kubrick harnesses the power of the absurd to expose the contradictions of seemingly powerful men and the ultimate futility of war. In order to most effectively provide an argument against nuclear deterrence, hateful prejudice, anti-communism and bureaucracy (among others), Kubrick ridicules them all with his cripplingly potent black humour. He stepped back from the debate, stopped feeling, started thinking and started laughing. This is how he learned to stop worrying and love the bomb. In my opinion, humour is the single most effective way to put across a wholly humanist point of view on the most controversial of ethical issues.
“The richest kind of laughter is the laughter in response to things people would ordinarily never laugh at.” Bill Hicks
Peter Watkins’ 1965 drama documentary The War Game supplied an altogether different argument against the nuclear arms race. Watkins dramatized a full-scale nuclear assault on Britain, which aimed for nuclear disarmament by terrifying the authorities with the apocalyptic consequences of nuclear warfare. The film was banned, but its message was clear and valid and became a powerful piece of propaganda for the CND. However, this approach means the whole debate is validated by clear support of one side over the other. Propaganda is a dirty word and propaganda will always be propaganda to the opposition. Propaganda is always propaganda, no matter what side it’s rooting for. Satire is completely unique in that the producer doesn’t take a side, but steps back and points out how ultimately ridiculous the whole thing is. It helps put things into perspective, as in a pointless argument, when both turn sides step back and say “wait, are we really arguing about this?” The tactic of subversion by humour is, in my opinion, the absolute utilitarian stance: not only is an argument avoided, but it’s bloody entertaining too.
Post-Hollywood Blacklist era, Dr Strangelove avoids being labelled as either anti-HUAC or pro-communist. The film sits in perfect tension between rubbishing the ridiculous communist conspiracies (typical of characters like Gen. Buck Turgidson and Gen. Jack Ripper during the post-war HUAC-dominated America) and validating them. The film is rife with this kind of irony, summed up best by the eternal line:
“You can’t fight in here, this is the war room” delivered by none other than Kubrick’s President of the United States, Merkin Muffley
Released in 1964, Dr Strangelove capitalizes on the tension of global post-war paranoia and the tragic, blood-stained past to crack the most inappropriate jokes to devastating effect. Kubrick’s black humour in Dr Strangelove was the joke needed to break the ice of the cold war – and despite its specific subject matter in this respect, his tendency to subvert conflict with comedy is universally appreciable. Dr Strangelove has the effect of La Grande Illusion, The War Game and Nuit et Brouillard rolled into one and injected with an infectious and hilarious absurdity. It is completely unique and the quintessential cold-war-era-HUAC satire. Probably my favourite film of all time.
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