Saturday, December 1, 2007

DR. STRANGELOVE'S SPELL

TVOntario played Stanley Kubrick's brilliant film from 1964, Dr. Strangelove - Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, tonight on their framework series, Saturday Night at the Movies. I watched it, again. They last played it a few months ago and I watched it then; and this time last year when, yes, SNATM played Dr. Strangelove.

... and guess what.

(I do exactly the same thing whenever SNATM plays The Dam Busters -- I think I'm at three times in the last two years now.)

I guess my only point is -- and I do get to the point sometimes, even if in an elliptical manner -- that this film demands I watch it every time it plays.

Tonight, my plan was to just watch the first five minutes (as I have a lot to do) and go back to my regularly scheduled program.

I would have been 12 or 13 years of age the first time I watched Dr. Strangelove; I knew who Stanley Kubrick was (even though I mispronounced his name Cub-rick, as in Cub Scouts) because of a little chamber picture that blew me away at the age of ten, 2001: A Space Odyssey -- and that was enough of a reason to watch.

I was absolutely lost into Strangelove on that first viewing.

Dr. Strangelove, like Kubrick's other great film, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Citizen Kane, King Kong (1933), Annie Hall, Wild Rovers, and a few other examples, is almost impossible for me to turn off or away from.

As a movie fan, this is one of those facts of life. To a movie lover, the above items are what a grease-burger and fries are to someone who craves their junk food. Although, the end results, let's hope, are radically different.

I don't know why I don't own this flick on video... I have most of Kubrick's films on the shelf.

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