Quoted By:
<span class="mu-i">“You would have never have found him through his office, Mr. President. Our Premier is a man of the people, but he is also a man if you follow my meaning.”</span>
One might argue that the Flooded World is in a Cold War, not unlike the countries in the film. The Toghril Khanate and its conquered territories are no different than the Soviet Union. Against them stands the Megiddan Empire and her allies – Babylonia, the Galapagan Commonwealth, the Andean Freeholds, and many more island-nations – the NATO. All the more poignant given how the Empire is built upon the ruins of North America’s western coast.
<span class="mu-i">“Gentleman, you can’t fight in here. This is the war room!”</span>
Not that anyone’s about to launch nukes at each other. If they hadn’t been destroyed during the Cataclysm, what few remaining ICBMs would’ve had their fissile materials converted into reactors. Earth is already bad enough of a mess without the additional complication of a nuclear winter. Besides, railguns and kinetic artillery did just as much damage without the fallout.
<span class="mu-i">“Shoot, a fella could have a pretty good weekend in Vegas with all that stuff!”</span>
But you’re here to watch a film, not reminisce, compare and contrast the Old World with the current geopolitical situation of the Flooded World. You and Gully are here to enjoy the film, and maybe enjoy a laugh at the expense of the OBI. But the best part? Even without the spooks ruining your morning, the film is still funny. Ripper ranting about “fluoridation” nearly makes you bust a gut, and Gully wheeze into her soft drink.
<span class="mu-i">“Okay, I’ll get your money for you. But if you don’t get the president on the phone, you know what’s gonna happen to you? You’re gonna have to answer to the Coca-Cola Company!”</span>
The tipping point for the hilarity comes at the climax. Slim Pickens screaming joyously like a madman and waving his hat as he rides an atomic bomb to his death, comes close. Somehow, you both manage to hold it in until the very end, when the titular Doctor Strangelove stumbles out of his wheelchair.
<span class="mu-i">“Sir, I have a plan…MEIN FURHER! I CAN WALK!”</span>
The tension snaps like a violin string, and the nearest viewers aren’t so keen as you and Gully both burst into raucous laughter. Pounding your seats, armrests and howling with unrestrained hilarity as Kubrick’s satire of the Cold War comes to an explosive end. The dulcet tones of Vera Lynn serenade the detonation of nuclear bombs across the world as the credits roll, bearing the names of men and women a world away, long since dead by over four hundred years.
>>Seven Samurai (1954)
<span class="mu-i">“Find hungry samurai. Even bears come down from the mountains when they’re hungry.”</span>
(cont.)
