Folamour n’était pas loin du vrai

Folamour n’était pas loin du vrai

Il y a un intéressant article de Stars and Stripes le 25 janvier (http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=67505) sur un film documentaire du Strategic Air Command, SAC Command Post, produit sans doute en 1963 pour contrer l’effet du fameux film de Stanley Kubrik Dr. Folamour (ou Dr. Strangelove – How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb). Le film n’était pas encore sorti mais on en connaissait déjà le contenu et Kubrik l’avait décrit précisément lors d’interviews. Tout cela faisait craindre au SAC une contre-publicité qu’il tentait de prévenir avec ce documentaire.

Finalement, le documentaire ne fut jamais rendu public et on vient de la découvrir dans les archives du SAC. Il me semble que l’intérêt de l’article se trouve dans les remarques, à la fin, selon lesquelles Dr. Folamour avait affolé le SAC et aussi combien ce film de fiction représentait une situation en réalité très proche de la réalité…

«The film — full title “Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb” — starred Peter Sellers, George C. Scott and Sterling Hayden as Ripper. It became a classic, and the American Film Institute named it among the best films ever made. But some of the most interesting reactions have come from those most familiar with the country's nuclear strategy.

»Fred Kaplan, in his book “The Wizards of Armageddon,” tells about Daniel Ellsberg and a midlevel government official taking an afternoon off in 1964 to see “Dr. Strangelove.”

»Ellsberg, the man who would later leak the Pentagon Papers, had been a RAND analyst and a consultant at the Defense Department. As he left the theater, Ellsberg turned to his colleague and said, “That was a documentary!”

»Burr said one former SAC officer had told him that some wing commanders ordered their crews not to see “Dr. Strangelove” when it came out.

»But there were also reports that the movie was popular among the Air Force's rank and file. Marvin Broyhill, a flight-line mechanic at a Strategic Air Command base from 1961 to 1964, said in an interview that “Dr. Strangelove” was the best movie ever made about SAC.

»He recalls fondly what Maj. Kong told his crew when he got the order to attack the Soviet Union. Broyhill said the little speech summed up perfectly what the Strategic Air Command had been about.

»“Heck, I reckon you wouldn't even be human beings if you didn't have some pretty strong personal feelings about nuclear combat,” Kong said. “But I want you to remember one thing: The folks back home is a-countin' on ya, and by golly we ain't about to let’em down.”»

“Ulysse”