The Cold War (1945-1989) was a war waged predominantly through fear and manipulation of the mind. Although no war was ever directly fought out between American and Soviet forces, numerous proxy wars took place as each superpower tried to defeat the other’s ideology and political system. Although the Cold War often heated up as well as cooled down, the world’s population had to live with the idea that both the Americans and the Russians had the power to destroy the entire planet.
Film director Stanley Kubrick understood this psychological distress masterfully. His film Dr Strangelove (or how I learned to stop worrying and love the bomb), released in 1963, only a month after the assassination of U.S. president J.F. Kennedy, is about what would happen if — through not fault of any of the superpowers’ administrations — the world found itself on the brink of a nuclear war. Dr. Strangelove shows the enormously negative effect of the Cold War on the mind, often taking it back to its most primitive and simple state. Although the crisis Kubrick narrates through Dr. Strangelove draws on the threat of nuclear war and extinction of the human race, he shows how man can be caught up in this resolve, be it through national pride or a primitive hunger for violence and destruction.
Kubrick’s other film concerning events of the Cold War, Full Metal Jacket, released in 1987, has established itself as one of the classic Vietnam films. A film divided into two halves, the first demonstrated the physical, yet more importantly the psychological challenges and distress U.S. Marine Corps boot camps cast upon the “killing machines” in the making, as well as the desperation for release and a way to escape it. The second half focuses on the military conflict in Vietnam from the perspective of Private Joker, a product of the marine boot camp, working as a journalist caught up in the violence of the Vietnam War.
The mental transitions shown in this film are as strikingly portrayed as in Dr. Strangelove. The G.Is’ conversion from what looks like almost childlike innocence to a marine claiming to bring peace to Vietnam yet possessing a hunger for violence is fascinating and brilliantly brought to the screen.
Let us now look at the events of each of the films in turn. First Doctor Strangelove (or how I learned to stop worrying and love the bomb) whose alternative title neatly sums up what Kubrick is trying to suggest, and gives hint of the absurdity this essay is trying to evaluate.
The story of this black and sarcastic comedy opens inside a B-52 bomber, currently at a “failsafe” point, receiving orders to launch a nuclear attack on Russia. Brigadier Jack Ripper orders his series of B-52 bombers over the code encryption service, the CRT 114, to surpass their “failsafe” points –the areas where they wait to receive orders, and to enter Soviet airspace to bomb selected targets. Ripper tells his Group Captain, Lionel Mandrake (the first of Peter Sellers’s three roles), that the Soviets have already launched an attack on America, but when he hears only pop songs on the radio, Mandrake discovers that there’s a personal motive behind Ripper’s order. Ripper tells Mandrake that he believes the communists are planning a conspiracy to “sap and impurify our precious bodily fluids”, hence to contaminate the West’s water which will ultimately lead to impotence.
Ripper uses “Plan R”, an emergency plan authorising personnel other than the President to command a nuclear attack if, under certain circumstances, the President is unable to call out an attack himself.
In the “war room” Air Force General Buck Turgidson informs the U.S. President, Merkin Muffley (the second of Sellers’s roles) of the imminent nuclear air strike. The only possible way to recall the air strike is through a three-letter recall-code, which Ripper is evidently not going to divulge. The President thus sends U.S. army troops to Burpelson Airfields to arrest Brigadier Jack Ripper.
As Ripper has warned his men that the “communist enemy” might take disguise in U.S. army uniforms, the base’s security forces open fire on the U.S. army. Ripper’s men surrender, and after hopelessly attempting to fight off the troops with only one machine gun and Mandrake to hold the belt of bullets, Ripper realises that he will be arrested and interrogated for the recall code. He therefore shoots himself in his bathroom.
Colonel Guano shoots his way into Ripper’s office and arrests Mandrake, believing that he is the commander in charge of a mutineer group of “deviated perverts”. Mandrake believes that he has worked out the Ripper’s recall code: P.O.E, the initials of “Purity of Essence” and “Peace on Earth”. Now it is Mandrake’s duty to contact the President in time.
President Muffley allows the Soviet Ambassador to enter the war room and contacts the Soviet Premier Dmitri Kissoff, explaining the situation and giving details of how to shoot down the bombers. However, the Soviet ambassador De Sadeski tells of a Doomsday machine, a machine automatically triggered, impossible to deactivate and capable of extinguishing all human life. And it is here where Dr. Strangelove comes lurking out of his shadow. The manic wheelchair-bound scientist of German descent hails the characteristics of the Doomsday machine as “credible and convincing”. Dr. Strangelove (formally known as Merkwürdigeliebe) shows a vast understanding of the complex strategies adopted by the superpowers. He also seems to suffer from Alien Hand Syndrome (now also known as Dr. Strangelove Syndrome) and frequently, as though suffering from Tourette’s syndrome, performs half-executed Nazi salutes.
The recall code reaches the War Room and all B-52s not yet shot down abort Ripper’s Mission. However, Soviet Premier Kissoff informs President Muffley that one plane is continuing its flight under the Soviet radar field. This is the very same B-52 bomber with which the film opened. Due to a Soviet missile hitting but failing to down the bomber, the CRT-114, amongst other instruments, is damaged and fails to receive the recall code. Low on fuel, the pilot of the bomber, Major Kong, realises that this is going to become a Kamikaze mission.
As the plane is damaged, Major Kong himself climbs down to where the bomb is hanging and forces the bomb-bay doors to open whilst sitting on the bomb. Hollering down through the air, Major Kong, as if in a rodeo, rides the nuclear bomb into the Soviet research base, triggering the Doomsday device.
With the triggering of the Doomsday device, the Soviet Ambassador explains that within ten months all mankind will be wiped out. Dr Strangelove suggests that a group of people be chosen and relocated to underground mineshafts away from nuclear annihilation to repopulate America in a post-apocalyptic world. The film concludes with the doctor — now beyond any semblance of sanity slowly climbing out of his wheelchair and shouting “Mein Führer, I can walk!”
What is most frightening about this film is that many of the absurdities and the military strategies (except Plan R, are true, which is why Kubrick decided to transform it into a comedy. He believed that the only way to demonstrate the intensity and utter stupidity of the thermonuclear dilemma was through satire and outrageousness. Throughout the film, comical yet frighteningly plausible absurdities illustrate how the escalation of the Cold War could rob people of their capacity for rational thought.
The first such absurdity we come across is “Plan R”, described in the following dialogue.
General Buck Turgidson: “Plan R is an emergency war plan in which a lower echelon commander may order nuclear retaliation after a sneak attack if the normal chain of command is disrupted. (…) The idea was for plan R to be a sort of retaliatory safeguard.”
President Muffley: “A safeguard?”
General Buck Turgidson: “I admit the human element seems to have failed us here. But the idea was to discourage the Russkies from any hope that they could knock out Washington, and yourself, sir, as part of a general sneak attack, and escape retaliation because of lack of proper command and control.”
However, Plan R in fact does exactly what it is trying to avoid. Because Jack Ripper has placed himself above the order of the president to launch the nuclear attack, it raises the question of just who, if anyone, is in charge. Even on the Russian side there seems to utter chaos and turmoil. When speaking to the Russian premier Dmitri Kissof on the phone, President Muffley’s reactions clearly demonstrate that Kissoff is not only under the influence of his country’s favourite alcoholic drink, but also in mid sexual intercourse. Turgidson sees this as proof that Kissoff is nothing but “a desperate atheist commie”, but Soviet ambassador De Sadeski sees Kissoff’s actions otherwise: “Our premier is a man of the people, but he is also a man, if you understand what I mean”.
If on the brink of nuclear war, one would hope for a firm leader in command. However, in showing that this is not the case for either superpower, Kubrick mocks the underlying assumptions of the Cold War and demonstrates their ridiculousness. So who is in charge? Ripper’s view is evident, as he believes he should have every right to launch an attack. Contradicting what Clemenceau once stated about war, Ripper illustrates his belief that “today, war is too important to be left to the politicians. They have neither the time, the training, nor the inclination for strategic thought.”
In a crisis such as this one, if one really wants to dig a little deeper into the question of who is in fact in charge, Kubrick offers the following ironic hint in the scene where Mandrake is desperately scavenging for loose change and orders his escort Colonel Bat Guano to shoot the lock off the Coca-Cola machine. After arguing that the machine is private property, Guano gives in and shoots the lock, but not before warning Mandrake that if he doesn’t get the president on the phone, he’ll have to “answer to the Coca Cola Company”.
Plan R was part of America’s “Deterrence” policy, a real-life policy adopted under the Eisenhower administration. Dr. Strangelove defines deterrence as “the art of producing in the mind of the enemy… the fear to attack.” Many of the policies and events during the Cold War, e.g. the arms race and the Cuban missile crisis, were trying to induce that sense of fear into the enemy’s head. The other example of the deterrence policy in Dr. Strangelove is the Soviet Union’s Doomsday Machine. This machine fills the criteria for what a deterrence policy must essentially consist of: knowledge that any direct attack, be it conventional or nuclear, will guarantee the extinction of mankind.
The role of the Doomsday machine in Dr. Strangelove is vital. The fact that it is triggered automatically upon attack by a machine and is impossible to untrigger is supposed to be seen as the ultimate defence insurer. Dr Strangelove describes the irrevocability of the Doomsday machine as “essential”, as its aim is too induce fear to attack into the adversary’s emotional state. However, the fact that this machine rules out “human meddling” brings us back to the suggestion that there is a “devolution of authority” taking place, the sense of not knowing who exactly is calling the shots: an administration, a lower-ranking general or a machine? On top of this, the Russians hadn’t openly admitted to possessing such a machine, to which the cold voice of Dr. Strangelove once more comments that “the whole point of the doomsday machine is lost if you keep it a secret! Why didn’t you tell the world, eh?”
What Dr. Strangelove most clearly demonstrates is the slow effect that Ripper’s attack on Russia and the inevitable outbreak of nuclear war has on the mind. The three most vital and symbolic characters in this film are General Buck Turgidson, Major Kong and Dr. Strangelove himself since it is they who “learn to stop worrying and love the bomb”.
In Buck Turgidson one sees a man for whom the idea of nuclear war between the superpowers is gradually going to his head, step by step. Turgidson clearly tries to hide his enthusiasm by combining the rational with the irrational a method that doesn’t quite come off and adds to the humourous effect of the film. Turgidson tries to convince President Muffley that the idea of nuclear war isn’t so bad if America is the first to strike which would only lead to “modest and acceptable civilian casualties.” And Turgidson’s definition of acceptable? “No more than ten to twenty million killed, tops. Uh… depending on the breaks.”
Turgidson is the kind of person who allows himself to get carried away on the brink of nuclear destruction, although one could also argue that he is realistically preparing for war, given that an attack has already been ordered by Ripper. Turgidson’s suspicion of the Soviets, in particular the Soviet ambassador De Sadeski when he is allowed into the war room, is evident: “he’ll see everything, he’ll see the big board”. However, his suspicion proves justified as he catches the ambassador secretly trying to take photographs. His suspicion shows its colours numerous times again throughout the film, even at the end, when discussing the fate of those remaining once the war has broken out. Dr. Strangelove’s idea of confining the survivors in mineshafts proves popular, yet Turgidson asks the president to ensure that no “mineshaft gap” develops.
One scene in which Turgidson’s suspicion is particularly interesting is where he begins to “smell a big, fat, commie rat” as Muffley is speaking to Kissoff on the hotline about Kong’s bomber plane. Here, Turgidson attempts to shift his desire for a nuclear outbreak onto the Soviet president, suggesting that Kissoff could be lying and is “ just looking for an excuse to clobber us”.
Undoubtedly, Buck Turgidson’s best moment of the film is when Kong’s B-52 is flying below the radar space and is minutes away from its target. It’s here that Turgidson seems to realise what this nuclear dilemma between the superpowers has turned him into, as his former overwhelming enthusiasm turns into a blank stare of embarrassment and loss of words:
Turgidson: “Well Sir, if the pilot’s good, see I mean, if he’s really he’s really sharp, he can barrel that baby in so low. You ought to see. It’s a sight! A big plane, like a ’52 – its jet exhaust frying chickens in a barn yard!”
President Muffley: “Yeah, but has he got a chance?”
Turgidson: “Has he got chance? Hell, ye….” He holds his hand to his mouth.
Major Kong, acted by Slim Pickens, is a prime example of “how to stop worrying and learn to love the bomb”. However, his character is very different to Turgidson’s, in the sense that Kong’s “love” is interpreted through his actions and is therefore somewhat more subtle than Turgidson’s.
As Plan R is transmitted into his B-52 bomber at the beginning of the film, Kong describes it as one of the “stupidest” things he’s ever heard over the earphones. He demands a confirmation, his hesitation and worry clearly visible. As the confirmation arrives, bringing the crew to believe that Washington has already been bombed and the president killed, Kong takes off his helmet and places on his head his “king of the rodeo” cowboy hat. Pickens’s expression and actions speak the words that the film does without. The viewer knows here that nationalism in nuclear warfare has taken another victim, because for Major Kong there are no more morals, just “nuclear combat, toe to toe with the Russkies.”
The second example of the determination Kong and his fellow pilots possess is when a missile strikes the B-52 bomber. Kong desperately orders his crew to extinguish the fire and restore the instruments as he tries to steer. This can be seen as an absurdity, since the pilots know they are going to be part of the nuclear warfare they believe has already begun. Although no one mentions it, they know that certain death awaits them when nuclear war breaks out, yet their desperation to navigate the plane back towards its targets suggests the enormous willpower within these pilots to drop the bomb on Russia.
Major Kong’s most striking contribution to Dr Strangelove, however, is the memorable scene where the bomb is dropped. With the door for the bombs release jammed, Kong insists on going down to try and fix the situation himself. The image of Kong climbing onto the bomb is one of the films greatest. The “Hi there” and “Dear John” graffiti only take the viewers eyes off the other message printed on the bombs: “Nuclear warhead, handle with care.” However, “care” in this context is defined by the will and enthusiasm to drop the bomb. This subtle joke is Kubrick at his very best.
The bomb is dropped, with Major Kong still sitting on it. Like a cowboy in a rodeo, he hollers out cries of adventure before the bomb reaches its target, resulting in a nuclear breakout. Kong’s cries of joy whilst swinging his cowboy hat clearly demonstrate how he has allowed American nationalism to get the better of him and his moral values. It is hard to resist the idea that the bomb’s phallic shape symbolises just how “attached” Kong has grown to it.
The most important character in the film is of course Dr Strangelove, the third of Peter Sellers’s three roles. Like Kong and Turgidson, Dr Strangelove also seems to share this bizarre obsession with the bomb and the idea of nuclear war. However, Dr. Strangelove sees things from a more strategic and expert point of view, often trying to suppress his animal hunger for nuclear annihilation. When discussing the Doomsday machine, Dr Strangelove does so with what looks like a restrained grin on his face. His crazed appearance and expertise on nuclear strategies suggest he has always had a fondness for “the bomb”. The character of Dr. Strangelove is reputedly based on Wernher von Braun, a Nazi scientist during the war who was brought to America as part of Operation Paperclip, in which numerous former Nazi scientists were co-opted to the US for their expertise.
Although for a title character little is actually seen of him during the film, Dr. Strangelove’s eerie presence is always felt within the War Room. When the recall code is put in, much to the seeming relief of the government officials, the camera cuts away to the German doctor, in his wheel chair, hiding in the shadows and keeping away from the short festivities. Dr. Strangelove’s description of the Doomsday machine is possibly the most frightening scene in the film. The talk of the deterrence policy (“the art of producing in the mind of the enemy… the fear to attack”) along with his strong German accent serve to echo the Nazi era in Germany and the Second World War. These terrifying echoes are the results of obsessions that reveal themselves as the events of the film unfold. However, unlike Turgidson and Kong, Strangelove sees a German empire mobilising for war, a mania that Strangelove is digging up. This makes the mad doctor address President Muffley twice as “Mein Führer” and involuntarily lift his arm in the Nazi salute.
Dr. Strangelove’s idea of confining certain people whose survival would be “worthwhile” to a mineshaft also suggests a Nazi-like scheme. His plan to use a computer to determine who should be allowed to survive and who should be wiped out, depending on youth, strength, sexual fertility and intelligence, means that in 100 years time, when man can emerge from these mineshafts, there will be a form of Übermensch, again exemplifying Dr. Strangelove’s Nazi-esque schemes. However, Dr. Strangelove’s plan is agreed upon by everyone in the war room, suggesting that Nazi-like ideologies as well as other primitive hungers for destruction travel quickly when it comes to nuclear war.
Dr. Strangelove is a symbol for the terror a nuclear outbreak would have caused. Even the idea of a nuclear strike is enough to drive people like Kong and Turgidson into an insanity of nationalism and war-driven hunger. The viewer, for his part, never really believes that these urges could possibly turn into truth and regards them – like Dr. Strangelove – as crippled and confined to a wheelchair. Until the final scene of the film, that is, when Strangelove rises from his chair yelling “Mein Führer I can walk!”
Kubrick’s second film concerning the Cold War is Full Metal Jacket, released in 1987. Full Metal Jacket opens with the cadets getting their heads shaved on their first day in Marine Corps training Parris Island, “an eight week college, for the phoney-tough and the crazy-brave.” Their drill instructor, the terrifying yet hilarious Sergeant Hartman, indoctrinates the young men into a “brotherhood” of killers. As well as Hartman, the two other central characters in this first half of the film are the everyday teenager Private Joker (who narrates the film) and the dumb, overweight Private Pyle. Private Pyle is the failure of the group, unable to complete any of the obstacles and a victim to Sergeant Hartman’s vicious abuse. Private Joker is assigned to aid Pyle and get him through the boot camp and into Vietnam.
Pyle succeeds and is sworn in as a marine. However, during the marines’ final night on the island, Joker — who is on watch that night — discovers Pyle sitting in the toilet room armed with a machine gun. Pyle’s rage and insanity have got the better of him, and he describes himself as being in “a world of shit.” Pyle shoots Hartman, the man who had made his life such a living hell, before taking his own life.
The film then quickly switches to Vietnam, where Private Joker is stationed as a reporter for the army newspaper Stars and Stripes. Early on, we witness Joker’s first duty in combat as the North Vietnamese try to overrun the U.S. army base on the Tet Holiday. Private Joker is then ordered to travel up to Hue along with press photographer “Rafterman”. There the two of them make contact with the “Lusthog Squad”, where Joker meets up with his old friend from Marine Corps boot camp Private Cowboy as well as the intimidating presence of the machine gunman known as Animal Mother.
As the squad is called up for patrol off the Perfume River, they find themselves in a city of ruins, with a sniper shooting at them. With two men down, Animal Mother takes over the command and uses a smoke grenade to hide Lusthog Squad from the sniper’s viewpoint as they advance. Upon discovering the sniper, Private Joker’s gun blocks as he realises the sniper is a young Vietnamese girl. Rafterman arrives in time to shoot the girl and save Joker. With the girl gasping on the floor begging for death, Animal Mother permits a “mercy killing”, which must be carried out by Joker due to his deprival in combat. Joker effectively shoots her before we cut to the scene of the soldiers marching whilst singing the theme tune to the Mickey Mouse Club.
In Full Metal Jacket, Stanley Kubrick displays the mental torment the Vietnam War wreaked on the minds of those who lived through it at first hand. The source of this torment in the first half of the film is Sergeant Hartman and his indoctrination and brainwashing of the G.Is in the making. Hartman’s job is to turn these young men into vicious humans whose job it is to “kill, kill, kill.” His first practice in shaping the mind is when he forces Private Joker to show his “war face” and attempts to create an attachment between the soldiers and their rifles by ordering the soldiers to give them a girls name. The idea of transforming these men into killers is a vital one, since this is what finally drives Pyle to kill Hartman.
Hartman also makes the propaganda very obvious during the recruit training, for example by getting his marines to chant in cadence “Ho Chi Minh is a son of a bitch! Got the blueballs, crabs and the seven year itch.” Propaganda combined with brainwashing in its lowest yet most effective of forms.
There are two instances where Hartman instils the Christian belief system into his Marine Corps, perhaps the cheapest way of trying to distance his men from the communists. Sergeant Hartman and the privates sing Happy Birthday to Jesus on Christmas day, and when Private Joker informs Hartman that he does not believe in the Virgin Mary, Hartman hits him in the face shouting: “You communist heathen, sound off that you love the Virgin Mary or I’m gonna stomp your guts out.”
However, political propaganda is something that is easy to programme into the minds of young soldiers. The will to kill is what Hartman is primarily focusing on, and through his obstacles — forcing his men to sleep with their rifles, giving their rifles a girls name, practising vicious attacks on the soldiers — Hartman manages to achieve his aim, thereby displaying the malleability of the human mind.
Hartman particularly acts out these brutal attacks on Private Pyle, whose life is transformed into a living hell in the Marine Corps depot. Singled out by Hartman, Pyle is subjected to such humiliating actions as marching with his trousers down whilst sucking his thumb and being forced continuously to attempt (and fail) the obstacles in front of the other marines whilst being told that “Your ass looks like 150 pounds of chewed bubblegum.” However, when Hartman manages to get the rest of the Marine Corps to turn on Pyle, the rage and the insanity begin to build up. Upon discovering a jelly doughnut in Pyle’s footlocker, Hartman lets the marines know that “from now on, whenever Private Pyle fucks up, I will not punish him. I will punish all of you!”
The build-up of insanity shows itself properly for the first time when Pyle is shown talking to his rifle, which he calls Charlene. Joker tells Cowboy that he’s worried about Pyle, but his concerns are ignored and rubbished. The second hint at insanity is when Hartman glorifies the Marine Corps by exemplifying the actions of Charles Whitman and Lee Harvey Oswald as skills acquired in the Marines. When describing what “one motivated marine and his rifle can do”, the camera zooms into Pyle’s expression of absorption. He is clearly allowing himself to be brainwashed by Hartman, but is registering the information differently from the other marines.
When Joker discovers Pyle in the bathroom during the final night on Parris Island, Pyle displays the skills he has gained in the boot camp and his obsession with his rifle by shouting “this is my rifle, there are many like it but this one is mine”, words preached earlier in the film by Hartman. Pyle kills Hartman before putting a bullet through his own head. Hartman’s indoctrination has clearly backfired and been misinterpreted by Pyle, who has turned into a killer who loves his rifle but cannot come to terms with the “world of shit” he is entering.
Once the film switches to Vietnam, we see the effects of the war on the emotional state of Joker. These effects can be compared with the psychological distress suffered by Kurtz in Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. On his helmet, Joker has “born to kill” scribbled, as well as a peace sign, symbolising that although he finds himself in war-torn country where man’s primal instinct is to survive and kill, there remains a sense of civilisation and morality within him, or as Joker describes it, the “duality of man, the Jungian thing”. When told that there two kinds of story which can be published in the army newspaper Stars and Stripes, “winning over hearts and minds” and “winning the war”, Joker makes sarcastic and witty remarks, clearly indicating his own stance on propaganda and lies.
When travelling up to Hue by chopper, Joker and Rafterman sit next to a G.I. firing at Vietnamese civilians. His motivation? “Anyone who runs is a V.C. (Vietcong), anyone who stands still is a well disciplined V.C.” Rafterman seems to be on the verge of throwing up when watching these actions. And when Joker asks the G.I. , whose name we never find out, how he can kill women and children, his response is one of the coldest moments in the film: “Easy. You just don’t lead ‘em so much.” This scene shows the first real signs of the abandonment of morality within Vietnam. This soldier, like Kurtz has crossed the invisible line where all sense of emotion and integrity ceases to exist.
Upon meeting with the Lusthog Squad, Joker again sees the emotional effects the war has induced upon the squad members, from their petty jokes about the dead North Vietamese soldiers to their behaviour towards the prostitute and their inhuman remarks when being interviewed by the American television team. Remarks such as “Does America belong in Vietnam, I don’t know. I belong in Vietnam” and “The gooks would rather be alive than free”, suggest the thirst for blood possessed by these soldiers, to whom the political notions of the war mean nothing. However Joker’s remark to the television team, “I wanted to meet interesting and sophisticated people of an ancient culture… and kill them”, suggests enormous sense of bitterness and sarcasm, almost a mockery of the other soldiers. The audience still believes that this is still the very same “wiseass” from the Marine Corps depot facility who has not let the events unfolding in front of his eyes affect his emotional state.
The final scene of Full Metal Jacket is the decisive one, where Joker’s mind will give in to the devastating circumstances surrounding him. A sniper hidden away in a city of ruins is shooting at the squad. With two men down, Animal Mother takes charge of the group and — under the cover of a smoke grenade — the group advances towards the building where they believe the sniper is taking cover. The group splits up and it is Joker who comes face to face with the sniper, who turns out to be a local teenage girl. Joker’s gun blocks and whilst trying to shield himself from the girl’s bullets behind a hall, Rafterman shoots the girl, thus saving Joker. The rest of the group crowds around the dying girl. Animal Mother suggests leaving her for “the gook-loving rats” but Joker refuses to allow her to rot there on the spot. The girl with wide-gazing eyes, quietly whispers the words “shoot me” to Joker. After a long hesitation with only the girl’s panting to be heard, Joker shoots her.
Joker’s decision to kill her in this scene shows how he has crossed the moral line into the jungle of mayhem and anarchy, like the rest of the G.I.s based in Vietnam. The humorous, apparently optimistic Joker is no more, as the unfolding events of the Cold War have transformed him into a man of a primitive state of mind, constantly prepared for violence and death. The squadron’s chanting of the Mickey Mouse Club theme at the very end of the film suggests that these men have reverted to childlike states of mind. But, Joker, although he comes to realise what has happened inside him, does not seemed phased by this idea, and openly speaks of how, like Pyle, he now finds himself in a “world of shit” only he is “alive and not afraid.”
With these two films – Dr Strangelove and Full Metal Jacket – Kubrick demonstrates masterfully just what sort of mentally distressing effects the Cold War played out. From the appetite for destruction possessed by highly ranked, yet vulnerable leaders of the superpowers to the young men sent around the world to fight in a war hardly worth fighting. The factors that provoke such a desire tend to be nationalism, peer pressure and an environment walled in by the uncertainty of war.
Dr. Strangelove and Full Metal Jacket vividly illustrate the gradual degeneration of the human sense of morality and emotion. Every main protagonist in these films has done what Kubrick’s subtitle to Dr. Strangelove dictates: “learn to stop worrying and love the bomb.” They have grown acquainted with the reality of war and death and have elevated them into their preferred ideology. Absurd as that may seem, absurdity is what these two films depict, from the U.S. army squads chanting Mickey Mouse songs to President Muffley’s famous line as Turgidson and the Soviet ambassador begin to scuffle: “Gentlemen please, you can’t fight in here. This is the War Room.”
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