And I was underwhelmed.
I’d heard so much about this movie, and Peter Sellers was great, but what a disappointing film.
George C. Scott was good too.
I didn’t like the movie though. It wasn’t funny. It wasn’t anything.
Duly noted.
It was hilarious.
Were you around for the Cold War?
you had to be there.
it came out during the cold war.
there was fear of real nuclear war. there were real close calls.
it was a funny release in a potentially troubling time.
It’s dry humor, but very funny if you were around for the cold war.
I suppose. I was born in '62.
I didn’t find the movie entertaining at all. Although I recognize the talent in Peter Sellers and George C. Scott.
Yawnfest though.
Huh. There are reasons I like it. For example, I grew up in a military family, worked on an Air Force Base in the '80s, remember the '60s when I was little, etc. Plus I like satire.
Different tastes, I guess. (I’ve noticed our taste in films are… somewhat different. 
)
that’s explains it. your short attention span caused you to miss much of the dark humor.
it was dark humor and fully referenced to the time it was in. even if you later watched it as a teen or adult you might not have good detailed recall of the current history of the times it was written in.
That’s interesting. I was born in the same year. I remember seeing the movie in college, in the early 80s. Maybe it was the college atmosphere, maybe it was the fact that it was the height of the Cold War, but I found it hilarious.
Practically everything Peter Sellers and Sterling Hayden say are laugh-out-loud funny.
But, you know, opinions and all that.
I think my laughometer is broken.
Well, there’s this other movie…
I’m starting to think that Kubrick’s work in general doesn’t “keep”. It’s always so bound up in the time when it was made. It lacks the timeless quality that truly great art has.
It was the weird over the top characters played straightforwardly that captured my enjoyment. Not for everyone even then. Seller’s RAF character was the only “normal” person in the film, IMHO.
Also, you can recognize talent without enjoying it, just like the OP. His mileage varied on the humor or entertainment quality of the film. Personally, I don’t like gladiator movies. I’ll never be over Rancho Grande.
As a Canadian, not only are you watching DS out of its time, but outside its culture. It’s American self-satire.
I’m sure the Cameroonians have an apocalypse myth and could devise an image of a stereotypical Cameroonian experiencing it, which wouldn’t resonate with me the same way I watch Slim Pickens riding the bomb and “get” it. That image says everything: America was incredibly powerful then, and we were going to behave like Americans and fuck it all up. Even before Vietnam that was understood. OTOH, where a non-American watches that scene in disgust, I also love how he goes out in style. You could play it as a Thug Life Vine and that would still be understood today.
Back in the 90s I used to sample great lines from videotapes of films and save them as WAV files (still have most of them). I started to do Dr. Strangelove, but then suddenly realized “I’m going to have to sample the whole damn movie!”
And I was born in '65 and don’t really remember caring too much about the Cold War. And when I first saw the film in my early teens I didn’t really ‘get’ it and didn’t laugh much. Once I got older however, I recognized it as the funniest film ever made. Take from that what you will… 
I could not **DISAGREE **more with this statement. Kubrick is to film what Shakespeare is to literature.
Funniest moment in the film is after Mandrake finds the radio playing music and realizes there can’t be a war happening and is initially unbelievably relieved to report this to Gen Ripper. And when Ripper sternly replies, “Mandrake, the wing will not be recalled!”, Peter Sellers, as the ultimate stuffy, unflappable, stiff-upper-lip British officer just replies, “Well, if you don’t mind me saying so sir, that’s, well, a rather odd way of looking at it. I mean, if the wing is not to be recalled, I…” And then it finally dawns on him that Ripper has gone off his nut, and is about to blow up the whole world, all he says is a calm resignation of, “ohhhhh…”
If you don’t get why that is so funny, forget seeing the movie’s comedic greatness.
I’m a relatively young '74 kid, and it’s one of my favorite movies. Different tastes and all.
As a Canadian I see the humour and do find it funny - so I’m not sure that “out of its time, outside its culture” arguement really holds water.
Well, at least admit the movie has the funniest phone conversation in film history.
But seriously…has anyone ever started a thread saying, “I just saw [old classic movie] for the first time and thought it was brilliant!” It seems like everyone who watches old, critically-acclaimed classics ends up disappointed. (For what it’s worth, I felt the same way about Citizen Kane – okay movie, but nothing all that special.)
Doesn’t do a thing for me. Nothing. I thought about smirking, but couldn’t muster the energy.
We get it. You don’t like movies that other people like.