Bergson and Kubrick: How I

Bergson and Kubrick: How I Learned to Laugh at Dr. Strangelove

an Analysis of Bergson's Laughter

As Bergson suggests, the comic and the human are inextricably linked: "the comic does not exist outside the pale of what is strictly human" (Bergson 3). Hidden in the self-awareness of humans is the kernel of comedy: we are able to laugh and be laughed at. Comedy brings us, so to speak, back down to earth -- lest we drift off into the ethereal atmosphere of our intelligence and lose all sense of ourselves, our very real (and physical) human nature. The fact that so much of humor in films is physical (and effectively so) bears testimony to what I have just stated: humor reminds us not only of who we are but also of what we are. We are not wholly spiritual or intellectual creatures: we are a strange union of spirit (intelligence) and body -- neither angels nor beasts but somewhere in between.

Bergson also suggests that to laugh, one must maintain an air of something like holy indifference -- a profound "lack of feeling" (Bergson 4) as he calls it, which allows one to view the drama of life as a spectator, whose soul is "thoroughly calm and unruffled" (Bergson 4). It is this sublime serenity that accounts for his ability to laugh, to find humor in all things human. His spirit is cleansed. He is in no need of a cathartic (tragic) effect in order to purify his emotions: they are already pure -- thus, he can laugh at himself and at his fellow man. Dr. Strangelove is a comedy (black, so they say) which examines modern man's struggle to attain purity ("purity of essence" is Jack D. Ripper's obsession) as well as his struggle to control both his fate and that of the world around him.

Finally, Bergson states that comedy is social. Laughter is contagious. And it has a "social signification" (Bergson 8). In this sense, Bergson approaches laughter from a functionalist theory or perspective. What is the function of laughter? What purpose does it serve? How does it operate? What are the necessary prerequisites? He analyzes each of these questions (and many others) in order to arrive at an understanding of how "laughter is a 'social gesture,' a function with a specific utility in society" (Laine). We might say, like Laine, that the purpose of comedy is to "serve society by pointing out our antisocial tendencies and inviting us to laugh at them, thus encouraging us to correct them" (Laine). Comedy reminds us not to be too idealistic: Don Quixote and Sancho are "runners after the ideal who stumble over realities, child-like dreamers for whom life delights to lie in wait" (Bergson 14). Life, then, is the principle. Comedy is the pure soul's light-hearted engagement with life. Serious and disturbing issues like death can in fact be dealt with in a comedic, light-hearted way when the soul is calm and indifferent. The question is: what calms the soul? What gives the soul an ability to laugh even in the face of grim death? (and Dr. Strangelove certainly does ask us to laugh in just such a face). Is it a knowledge of life after death? (Dr. Strangelove does end with a love ballad -- Vera Lynn singing "We'll meet again," perhaps suggesting the possibility of life after death, the possibility of Strangelove's madcap regeneration of the human race in his underground harem, or the possibility that Vera Lynn was all wrong -- that humanity is doomed and that Kubrick is getting in one final joke as the world obliterates itself; this latter possibility may be what gives the film it's "black comedy" label -- it is dark humor, macabre humor, gallows humor).

Bergson's theory of laughter must ultimately confront the serious questions, for, as he states, comedy by taking nothing seriously takes everything seriously. And yet, seriousness is not the issue. In comedy, a scene is funny "whether serious or trifling" (Bergson 145). The reason is that comedy does not attempt to rouse the emotions -- not in the way that tragedy does. Tragedy causes us to look inward, to separate ourselves from society for a moment in order to cleanse, to purify our spirits. Comedy causes us to look outward, to gather together in society. Comedy returns us to earth and readies us for transcendence again: it calls us back to ourselves only so that we may look around and see that we are not automatons. "As soon as we forget the serious object of a solemnity or a ceremony, those taking part in it give us the impression of puppets in motion…complete automatism…" (Bergson 45-6). Comedy laughs at the mechanical, at the disruption of the mechanical, at the restoration of the humanness of our lives; it destroys pomposity, disturbs rationality, throws off sanctimony, and makes us seem worse than we are. As Aristotle states in his Poetics, comedy is "an imitation of characters of a lower type, not, however in the full sense of the word bad" (Aristotle). Tragedy portrays as us better than we are (the tragic hero is, by definition, better and greater than the average man); comedy portrays us as worse than we are (the comic hero is defective, wanting in some sense). As Bergson insists, "Unsociability in the performer and insensibility in the spectator…are the two essential conditions" of comedy -- the third is automatism, "the involuntary gesture or the unconscious remark…by which the person unwittingly betrays himself" (Bergson 145-6).

Bergson would say that gallows humor, ala Dr. Strangelove, contains each of these three conditions: its characters are oddly separated from one another (Jack D. Ripper -- the man at the heart of the film's conflict -- is perhaps the most isolated man in the world, and at one point he isolates himself from his only companion, Mandrake, in order to take his life in the bathroom); its audience is insensible (and yet sensible, or else it does not get the joke) to the death and destruction that awaits the world once Major Kong rides the bomb to its target; and the comedy stems from the utter disruption of the war machine -- the "perfect," mechanistic system of war politics that suddenly goes completely haywire and sends everyone running for cover. The sort of gallows humor that Dr. Strangelove projects is "typical of the nations which are oppressed by their invaders" and provides a kind of moral support to those who wish to challenge their oppressors (Obrdlik 709).

Why Dr. Strangelove is Funny

The title itself announces the film's function: Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb. It is going to present in terms of ironic juxtaposition, in terms of charactonym ("Strangelove" suggests the strangle love harem that will "solve" the threat of immanent destruction), and tongue-in-cheek satire. The film also claims to be an instructional: it will show the viewer how the subject learned something -- namely, how he learned to throw off his cares and happily embrace a weapon of mass destruction.

Kubrick set out to write a serious film -- but as he began working on the plot he saw how the premise was simply so absurd that it could not be taken seriously, at least not directly. Therefore, he began pushing its absurdity to its logical end and by doing so found he could approach the seriousness of the subject much more easily. By using satire, gallows humor, slapstick and a stark visual style, Kubrick could appeal to a Cold War culture in the grip of nuclear hysteria and sexual/social revolution.

Dr. Strangelove deftly blends slapstick and political/social satire. George C. Scott's Gen. Turgidson (his very name is suggestive of the swollen, egoistic members of the State, occupying the bloated table under the "big board") bumbles his way around the War Room, chomping on his gum like a horse, tumbling across the floor in his militaristic zeal, and tussling with the Soviet observer. He is a long lost member of the Three Stooges. In fact, the film might just as well be staring Larry, Curly and Moe. Between Scott and Sellers (who plays Group Captain Lionel Mandrake, Strangelove, and President Merkin Muffley -- whose name "merkin" is a term that means "pubic wig"), buffoonery is not lacking.

The uses of laughter in this film are social and political; they are gentle and acerbic; they are meant to both bite and amuse. Scott's Turgidson is so humorous with his facial expressions and acrobatics (recovering gracefully from a tumble without missing a beat in his dialogue and impersonating a B-52 as it embarks on a mission that will spark world destruction) that one can easily appreciate the film for Scott's antics alone. But Scott is not the only actor in the film. Sterling Hayden plays the unhinged Brigadier General Ripper, whose obsession with Purity ("I don't avoid women, Mandrake, but I do deny them my essence") is delivered with point-blank seriousness (which fulfills the condition of Bergson's rules of comedy -- that its characters must be unsocial; Ripper is as unsocial as they come). And Sellers plays the repressed social engineer Strangelove, the timid Merkin Muffley, and the persevering Mandrake -- all with mechanical precision. Kubrick's unflinching camera acts as a character, too, slyly observing the exposition of humanity in all its grimly humorous glory.

This film belongs to a culture that has rejected the status quo -- the quaint picturesque comedies of the 1940s and 1950s; it belongs to a culture that is bordering on nihilism, anarchy, revolution -- anything that will help it to get away from the culture that has brought us the faceless, nameless idiots running the War Room in Dr. Strangelove. The film offers no solutions -- it only asks us to present ourselves to world with fresh eyes, a pure soul able and willing to laugh at its human foibles and failings, and begin to meditate upon a new direction, a new solution perhaps to the problem of nuclear proliferation. It even suggests that there is no answer -- at least, no political answer to the Cold War fears that generated the framework of the film.

Dr. Strangelove is not likely to be funny to everyone. As Bergson states, in order to laugh, one must possess a kind of indifference. I have suggested that the indifference must be a kind of holy indifference rather than an earthly indifference. An earthly indifference is not likely to find humor in the comedy of man anymore than an unstable soul who cannot take a moment to see how he fits into the whole of society. But holy indifference allows one to see things in their proper place, allows one to observe himself and those around him with a steady detachment that keeps him from becoming overwhelmed by the drama, yet allows him to assist in the communal trials of social life. One must be more than indifferent in order to get the supreme joke: he must be a saint, happy even when witnessing the farce of low types attempting to be big men (as they do in Dr. Strangelove).

The target of the film is, of course, the war hawks mirrored by Ripper, Turgidson, the Soviet Ambassador, and others. Ripper represents the stolid, overwrought neoconservative taxed beyond his means by an undisciplined imagination. He is obsessed with water conspiracies and the loss of his "essence" through sexual intercourse; the reality is that he has no sense of his essence whatsoever -- which is why he is perfectly comfortable sending a squadron of bombers to blow up the world before he blows his own head off. Mandrake represents the typical diplomatic officer who very carefully navigates the minefield of Ripper's emotions to retrieve the data needed to halt the bombing. Muffley represents the weak and useless world leader. Turgidson represents the military man who lives in awe of military might and strategy but is, sadly, a boy not a man. Strangelove represents the repressed Id, which can no longer repress itself. Each of these is a kind of cultural stereotype. At moments, their seriousness forces the audience to take a big gulp, as when Ripper shoots himself, or as violence breaks out on the American base. But the comedy is essentially crafted to provoke the boundaries that Americans have set up in their own intellects. It is meant to posit questions about (if we have it) an unfailing devotion to and faith in American foreign policy and those behind it.

Kubrick and Allen: Two Different Types of Comedy

Woody Allen's comedies deal with romantic love; Kubrick's with socio-political problems. Allen's comedies are focused on the differences between the sexes, the failure of modern-day couples to work through their problems. Some are more light-hearted and hopeful than others (Broadway Danny Rose, for example, is Allen at his romantic best: he plays the bumbling talent agent, Mia Farrow plays the love interest who almost gets him killed, who causes him to lose his biggest act, and who breaks his heart -- yet humbly returns to him in the end to be forgiven, embraced, and absolved). Kubrick is not interested in absolution, so to speak -- at least not in Dr. Strangelove. He is interested primarily in framing a problem -- the absurdity of modern warfare, modern politics, modern everything in fact (Mandrake needs a quarter to call the War Department with the code that might save humanity, but the soldier beside him is infuriatingly reluctant to shoot the lock off the Coke machine because he fears what Coke might have to say about it). Kubrick is filming cutthroat satire and is not interested in affairs of the heart; Allen could also shoot cutthroat satire -- but he never lost sight of the heart, the way it hurts, the way it yearns for a connection, the way it tries to overcome.

Allen shows how the comic and the human are intimately linked, just like Kubrick does in Strangelove -- but the delivery by each is completely different in terms of showing. Allen shows humanity by depicting the humans in a sad, realistic way. Annie Hall is relentless in the way it hammers home the difficulty of relationships in the latter days of the 20th century. Midnight in Paris blends comedic reality with comedic fantasy, as the main character time warps back to the early 20th century. Overall, Allen cannot resist empathizing with his characters. Allen pities them, he loves them, he wants to see them happy, even if he knows they cannot always be.

Kubrick, on the other hand, does not exactly empathize with his characters. He is lampooning real persons. He is using satire to skewer Americana. He sees nothing worth saving in the facade of American politics and looks forward to the dropping of the bomb with apparent glee. He presents humorous characters and wild caricatures. The audience is not meant to empathize with Ripper, with Turgidson, with Mandrake or Muffley. He is meant to laugh at them, to question his own beliefs, his own faith, his own self. He is meant to see the "mechanical" contraption of American politics in all its unvarnished, unscripted horror.