A House of Dynamite
⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ (out of 5 stars)
Director Kathryn Bigelow may not be a household name to most movie goers, except that her historical significance is that she will be the first woman to win the Academy Award for Best Director for her film The Hurt Locker. Despite being credited with cult classics like Point Break, her career has come to be defined by unparalleled political and military-inspired storytelling. By skirting along the fine line between statement and partisanship, the celebrated filmmaker continues to develop projects that are compelling and confronting for all who discover her work.
Her latest project is based on the screenplay from Noah Oppenheim (Jackie) that opens the door to the reality of nuclear war when a single nuclear warhead is launched by an unidentified enemy. As the object hurls towards the continental United States, every government agency must implement the drills required by each branch's protocol. Yet, in the 18 minutes leading up to the potential impact, Bigelow takes the audience through three different points of view as the drama becomes a horrific truth. Beginning at a military base in Alaska —the first to identify the threat —things quickly move to the White House Situation Room, where the intelligence community must rally the nation's leadership to determine the necessary actions. Culmination in the phone call to the President of the United States (Idris Alba), who is left with making the harrowing decision on how to respond as a world leader of a sovereign country that is under attack.
The brilliance of the screenplay and direction lies in how they lay out all the potential scenarios of a nuclear attack without making any one country the enemy or any one political party the patsy. Front-loaded with a cast that all deserve to lead this film, few beyond Alba are given the sole position of hero or weak link. Rebecca Ferguson, Jared Harris, Tracy Letts, Anthony Ramos, Greta Lee, and Jason Clarke are mere bit players who capture the humanity of this situation while doing their best to fulfil their roles within this unprecedented situation. There is little time to take a breath, much less make an unemotional decision, as Bigelow keeps the intensity and dramatic tension at fever-pitch from the opening sequence through to the unexpected conclusion. There is hope that those who hold the keys to these arsenals would know what to do in these scenarios, but to err is human.
A House of Dynamite is a reference to the arduous task of world powers holding onto arsenals of nuclear weapons as a means of keeping the peace by leaving the world's population living in a house of deadly explosives. Each step of this production interacts with the human and moral sides of this harsh reality. By showing how military, government and service organisation personnel are expected to react in these true-to-life situations, Oppenheim's exceptional screenplay will leave audiences talking about this film for days afterwards. A tale that can be labelled as a warning to us all, and determines how we would respond in the same situation that unfolds on screen.
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Reel Dialogue: Who is really in control of this world?
During a poignant scene, Lieutenant Commander Robert Reeves (Jonah Hauer-King), a retaliatory strategy advisor trained to guide the President through retaliation plans, takes a moment to pray. The President asks whether the man received any guidance, as the most powerful man in the world acknowledged that he was at a loss about what to do. A scene that begs the question of who is really in control in this world.
In our personal lives and in the news, it is a great question. Things around the world seem outside of our control. War, terrorist attacks, floods, earthquakes… or in our personal lives… a bad diagnosis or one bad investment, and we realise that it might be a pipe-dream to think that we are in control of our own destinies.
Money, beauty, power and control are fleeting. Who is truly in control of this world?
Beyond all of the conspiracy theories, the answer may be more straightforward to discover than you would think. Of all places to look, the Bible provides an answer to the question of control. Even when this world seems out of control, there is one who is all-knowing, all-powerful and everywhere.
The God of the Bible continues to prove that, despite what the media and entertainment want to tell us, he is ultimately in control.
