I laughed, but now I laugh...until I cry.

Rating: 10/10 (2 February 2003)

What an excellent film. I did not understand or enjoy this film when I was younger but I would hear folks talk about it throughout my lifetime. I saw it in bits in pieces growing up and it never appealed to me. Then one day after I watched Peter Sellers in "Being There", and Stanley Krubeck died, I decided to watch Dr. Strangelove, this time all the way through.
I laughed...then I cried. The opening sequence is a sexual as they come, and the satire of way the cold war was presented will make you snicker/laugh without you really wanting to. I am a product of "after the cold war" not quite fully understanding the "who is superior" ego of the two "Super powers" of Russia and the United States until it was over and I learned about it in elementary/junior high school history classes, this film finally began to make alot of sense now that I am older.
Besides the wonderful Peter Sellers playing multiple rolls, you had the wonderful George C. Scott who had many lines that made you laugh but in 2003, I am really wondering who wrote those lines for him with what we have approaching. Same with Slim Pickens and Sterling Hayden. Looking around the backgrounds the one thing that made me roll over with laughter was the Air Force bases with BIG signs declaring, "Peace is our Business". And of course the immortal line from Peter Sellers as George C. Scott was claiming that a Russian Ambass. was taking pictures of the war room and they got into a scuffle. Peter Sellers, as President of the United States tells them: "Gentlemen, there is no fighting in the war room."
This film depicts a past fear of a bomb that shouldn't have been directed to be shot, and the retaliation of the country being shot of. I say past, since this was 1964. I am writing this in 2003 and the past, has sadly become a fear of the present. A must see brilliant film. One of the 10 best of all time.