Brilliant Cold War Satire

Rating: 9/10 (9 July 2006)

First off, this movie is neither overly dramatic or serious, nor is it a laugh-out-loud gagfest like "Airplane." I didn't really find this movie to be really all that funny, but I did appreciate the cynical humor that Kubrick had injected into this masterpiece. Kubrick's approach of treating nuclear holocaust as absurd and insane through absurd and insane characters and dialogue makes for far more entertaining cinema than a Cold War thriller that takes itself far too seriously.
The main characters are exaggerated versions of the participants in the military-scientific complex (I made that phrase up, but it seems to encompass the world that Kubrick thinks is real) in the United States and the Soviet Union, and the craziness of their thoughts and actions conveys Kubricks dim view of brinksmanship and the nuclear arms race. This film was truly a labor of love, with the set designers and the actors putting in lots of time and effort . All of the actors do a splendid job here. The clear standout---and the person Kubrick wanted as this film's star---is obviously Peter Sellers, who is a master of versatility. As others have mentioned before, George C. Scott's portrayal of the pugnacious general foreshadows his most famous role, that of General George Patton. This is an intelligent movie, but it is far from being a boring or pretentious movie. You may not laugh, but you may smile at Kubrick's implicit misanthropy. The chills of nuclear war are lightened with Scott's bombastic exclamations and Dr. Strangelove's shouts of "Mein Fuhrer!" DO watch this genuine masterpiece.