I once mentioned Dr. Strangelove to one of my editors, and she wondered why men love it so much, and that it did nothing for her. She thought "it must be a gender thing".

Good question! It does nothing for my wife, either, and yet, I don't know a guy who doesn't like Dr. Strangelove. Why is that? Well, there are a host of reasons:

Guys spent their childhoods playing GI Joe, blowing things up, breaking things, fighting with each other, and generally expelling lots of energy, sweat and (later) testosterone. And in many respects, Kubrick's American actors: Sterling Hayden, George C. Scott, and Keenan Wynn, are all playing variations on those childhood GI Joe/Sgt Rock/John Wayne images. As Patton once said (and Patton is probably as popular a guy film as Dr. Strangelove--it doesn't hurt that both star George C. Scott in his two best roles):

Men, this stuff that some sources sling around about America wanting out of this war, not wanting to fight, is a crock of bulls***. Americans love to fight, traditionally. All real Americans love the sting and clash of battle.

You are here today for three reasons. First, because you are here to defend your homes and your loved ones. Second, you are here for your own self respect, because you would not want to be anywhere else. Third, you are here because you are real men and all real men like to fight.

When you, here, everyone of you, were kids, you all admired the champion marble player, the fastest runner, the toughest boxer, the big league ball players, and the All-American football players. Americans love a winner. Americans will not tolerate a loser.

From everything I've read, nuclear combat, and the possibility of it escalating into world destruction properly terrified Stanley Kubrick, yet he was no pacifist or kneejerk left-winger. He understood war, and its importance to civilization. Which is why the most realistically photographed scenes in Dr. Strangelove are those on the B-52 and the fighting at Burpleson Air Force Base. Kubrick began his film career as a documentarian, and he brings this same approach to photographing these scenes. He and Ken Adam, his production designer, built their B-52 interior with no cooperation from the US military, and only a single photograph of the cockpit from an aviation magazine to guide them. And yet, it feel absolutely authentic. And that authenticity is the base that allows the film's Swiftian satire to succeed. Any other director, handed the script for Dr. Strangelove, would have thrown realism out the window, and shot the film on wild psychedelic sets, such as those in 1960s camp such as Casino Royale or the Adam West Batman series.

Speaking of the script, as I said in March, when I watched Strangelove with 'Group Capt. Mandrake', I said to him, "I don't know if this is the best script ever written, but it's right up there. This is incredible writing." Peter George, an ex-RAF officer had the original concept of a nuclear thriller. Kubrick had the key idea of turning it into an over-the-top Swiftian satire of the Cold War. And Terry Southern and Peter Sellers helped to gin up the humor. (Between the two of us, The Group Captain and I have every line in the film memorized. What the freaks who saw Rocky Horror over and over again did to it in the late 1970s, we can do Strangelove. Be afraid. Be very afraid.