Fail Safe (1964)

 Sidney Lumet's "Fail Safe"

What's most striking about Sidney Lumet's 1964 film "Fail Safe" is how closely it resembles Stanley Kubrick's "Dr. Strangelove" from the same year. The only difference between the two is that a technical malfunction takes the place of "Strangelove's" insane colonel. The similarities were so uncanny that Kubrick even filed a copyright infringement lawsuit.

Because of this, "Fail Safe" just feels like a copycat of a film, despite being a complete opposite in tone. However, if I move beyond its parallels to Kubrick's film, it stands individually as a moderately interesting work. It is a great realist exercise in observing the dangers of nuclear strikes and the likely ramifications of an impending nuclear incident. 

Of course, because the film came out in 1964, it seems to be a direct reaction to the Cuban Missile Crisis and the red-hot fever of the Cold War (ironically). It is a great pulse of a time in which society was on edge from the growing conflicts between the U.S. and Soviets. While "Dr. Strangelove" makes it feel utterly absurd, "Fail Safe" makes it feel very real and serious.

Sidney Lumet's direction also aids in creating the tense atmosphere of the film. With its theatrical style, dramatic silences, claustrophobic close-ups, and sharp shadows in the black-and-white cinematography, the film really illuminates its own sense of peril and anxiety. It's clear that Lumet was a director extremely capable of adapting to his subject matter.

Although "Dr. Strangelove" will always be remembered far more than "Fail Safe," Lumet's film still offers a great dramatic interpretation of very possible circumstances. Nuclear fallout has been a continued threat since the U.S.'s dropping of Fat Man and Little Boy. It makes sense that such a critical lens has been applied to modern politics and the obsessions with the possibilities of what could happen.