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Nuclear imagery in film, 1980-85

Crawford, Daniel Owen, M.A.

The American University, 1990

UMI 300 N. ZeebRd. Ann Arbor, MI 48106

NUCLEAR IMAGERY IN FILM 1980-85 by Daniel Owen Crawford submitted to the Faculty of the College of Arts and Sciences of The American University in Partial Fulfillment for the Degree of Master of Arts in Film and Video

Signatures of Committee: Chair: yrrX^'

(Lj& £.

Dean of the College

December 21, 1990 Date

1990 The American University 7 Washington, D.C. 20016

ffHE MEPJCAN U17I7EEGITY LIBPM^V © COPYRIGHT by DANIEL OWEN CRAWFORD 1990 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED NUCLEAR IMAGERY IN FILM BY Daniel Owen Crawford ABSTRACT Before the development of the atomic bomb, the unknown was a successful element of drama. Horror films of the 1950s showed the movie audience a multitude of monsters that were the result of exposure to radiation. The results of radiation and atomic warfare have been incorporated into films of a variety of genres to the present day. This paper will discuss the images that nuclear warfare and the "mushroom cloud" have taken in a select group of films produced in the five-year period 1980-1985. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I would like to thank Dr. Eric Smoodin, director of my thesis committee for his patience and understanding through the long process of completing this thesis, as well as Dr. Huma Ibrahim and Professor Ronald Sutton, my committee members. I would also like to thank Dr. Spencer Weart, author of Nuclear Fear: A History of Images for his sensitive and intelligent approach to the subject of nuclear imagery. Finally, I would like to thank my mother for her spiritual nature, and my father for his logic and insight. TABLE OF CONTENTS

ABSTRACT ...... ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ...... iii INTRODUCTION ...... 1 THE ATOMIC C AFE ...... 6 HIROSHIMA MON AMOUR ...... 10 ALTERED STATES ...... 13 BLADE RUNNER ...... 19 THE ROAD WARRIOR ...... 26 TESTAMENT ...... 34 CONCLUSION ...... 40 BIBLIOGRAPHY ...... 45 FILMOGRAPHY ...... 47 INTRODUCTION

Before the development of the atomic bomb, the unknown was a successful element of drama. Orson Welles' radio adaptation of H. G. Wells' The War of the Worlds in 1938 was a documented case of mass hysteria, brought on by the public's misunderstanding of a radio drama that portrayed the invasion of the earth by alien beings. Horror films of the 1950s showed the movie audience a multitude of mutant beings that were the result of exposure to radiation. This plot device proved to be a popular one through the present day— from The Incredible Shrinking Man to the recent film Night of the Comet. Radiation and life on a dying planet are ideas that play on a viewer's sense of the unknown and adventure. It can be said that we fear the nuclear holocaust and make a cognitive correlation of the shape of the mushroom cloud to total destruction. The shape of the mushroom cloud in casual, simplistic reference has come to represent a symbol of destruction. The opening sequence of the new Twilight Zone, based on the original Rod Serling series, features a montage of images set against the now clichd starlit sky— a doll that comes to life, the

1 2 halo of light that contains Rod Serling appearing from the grave, and the mushroom cloud of an atomic blast. The Twilight Zone traditionally lures its viewers with a menu of story lines based on the unknown, the macabre, and the haunted. By choosing the atomic blast for its opening credits, the production team of the show illustrates that the fear of nuclear destruction is as deeply rooted in the general public as ghosts, alien invaders, or zombies rising from the dead. A 1989 television advertisement for Ocean Pacific ski wear, geared toward the young, trendy consumer shows a skier lunge off a mogul and into footage of a nuclear blast. Here the mushroom cloud is used by Madison Avenue to evoke a feeling of ultimate conquest to the consumer, the nuclear blast representing unparalleled power and strength over nature. The 1990 television series The Wonder Years tells the story of a boy's adolescence in the late 1960s. The show carefully dresses the stage in 1960s props and sentiments— the war in Vietnam, the fashions, the music— a sense of "the greening of America." In one episode, the main character is rejected when he asks a girl on a date. The scene cuts to a shot of a nuclear blast to represent his feelings of rejection. The choice was very effective and humorous— yet the universal understanding of the image 3 is frightening. The use of a symbolic image requires understanding by the audience to be effective. If not understood by the viewer, the image has no impact. This use of the mushroom cloud in The Wonder Years illustrates an understanding by the writer that fear of nuclear war is internalized by the general public. Years earlier, the image of the nuclear blast was used by the media to conjure a variety of feelings in the viewer. A 1955 Atomic Energy Commission film stated that "the towering cloud of the atomic age is a symbol of strength . . . for freedom-loving people everywhere.1,1 "Most striking of all, a 1947 magazine article about the medical benefits of nuclear energy was illustrated with a smiling man rising from a wheelchair, lifted, as it were, by a superimposed golden atomic cloud."2 How these images of atomic and nuclear destruction have been absorbed by popular culture films will be addressed in this paper, by showing a sample of the images and story lines presented in films in a five-year period (1980-85):

‘Spencer R. Weart, Nuclear Fear; A History of Images (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1988), 403. 2Spencer Weart, from pamphlet "Atomic Tests in Nevada" (Atomic Energy Commission, 1955), 403. 4 • Altered States. 1980 This film chronicles the experiences of a scientist who experiments with altered states of consciousness. His experiments bring him face to face with his deepest fears. Among them is nuclear warfare. In a hallucination sequence he experiences nuclear destruction, and images of the mushroom cloud are utilized. • Blade Runner. 1982 An emotionally traumatized policeman is called out of retirement to dispose of human replicants, against the backdrop of a post-apocalyptic city. Although not overtly concerned with warfare as a theme, it definitely questions the quality of life possible following nuclear attack, and in our present, technology-based society. • Testament, 1982

In a remote area of California as an ordinary day in the life of a family ends with their realization of a nuclear attack. As the mechanized world comes to a halt, they are forced to reflect on their sense of purpose and community. • The Road Warrior. 1982

Incorporating the nihilistic attitudes of the "punk" movement and drawing upon the elements of the classical western, this second film in the Mad Max trilogy utilizes the post-apocalyptic landscape as "the new frontier." Max must decide between his lone survival techniques, and the need to belong to a community.3 A documentary film, The Atomic Cafe4 (1982) will be used to reflect on the history of nuclear imagery, because the film's production date fits within the time frame chosen for this paper. Hiroshima. mon Amour5 (1958) will be discussed briefly, to illustrate how earlier films addressed the issue of nuclear war.

3Altered States, directed by Ken Russell, with William Hurt, Blair Brown, Charles Haid (Warner Brothers, 1980); Blade Runner, directed by Ridley Scott, with Harrison Ford, Rutger Hauer, Sean Young, M. Emmet Walsh, and Joanna Cassidy (Warner Brothers, 1982); Testament. directed by Lynn Litman, with Jane Alexander and William Devane (Paramount, 1983); The Road Warrior, directed by George Miller, with Mel Gibson (Warner Brothers, 1982).

4The Atomic Cafe (Archives Project, Inc., 1982).

Hiroshima. mon Amour. directed by Alain Resnais, with Emmanuelle Riva, Elji Okada, and Bernard Fresson (Argo: Pathe, 1959). THE ATOMIC CAFE

The Atomic Cafe (1982), produced and directed by Jayne Loader, Kevin Rafferty, and Peirce Rafferty, is a documentary on the introduction of atomic warfare and how Americans reacted to its reality. The film is assembled from selected newsreel footage, government agency films, and interviews. The film begins dramatically with footage of the first atomic weapons tests captured on film at Alamo Gordo, New Mexico. The Trinity Tests, as they became known, ushered the United States into an era of controversy and an alarming level of technological advancement. President Harry Truman called it "the greatest scientific example in history,"1 and soon the splitting of the atom led to the development of arsenals of similar weapons. Slowly, through newsreel footage and, later, television, the image of the blast became familiar to the general public.

In newsreel footage produced by Paramount in 1947, a likeness of the Statue of Liberty is destroyed by a

•From footage in The Atomic Cafe.

6 7 mushroom cloud— a symbol of the growing Soviet threat. This image represented the growing uncertainty and paranoia of the Cold War. The scattered remains of the countries caught within the two boundaries of East and West left the United States unsure of its allies in Europe following the Second World War. The "moral" and economic Cold War in post-war Europe2 brought us to the realization that military secrets had been leaked concerning the recipe for atomic weapons. The U.S. "upper hand" could be lost to the development of more powerful bombs by the emerging power of the Soviet Union. These fears were confirmed in August 1949 when it was determined that an atomic blast had occurred in Russia. Civil defense messages urged parents to train their children to avoid shock and injury produced in atomic warfare. In 1950,the invasion of Korea by the Chinese and the resulting intervention by the United Nations troops placed the threat of atomic war even more prominently in the American state of mind. Congressman James E. Van Sandt of Pennsylvania reasoned that "it is impossible to be diplomatic with Russia," and that "the bomb should be used in China and Korea." How likely was an enemy to

2From The Atomic Cafe. 8 deploy its weapons? Were others' weapons as powerful as those of the United States? These questions brought about the development of an even more powerful hydrogen bomb. The Casta Bravo test in 1954 proved to be more spectacular and frightening than its developers could foresee. The public set out to do its best to prepare itself for nuclear warfare. The naivete of the effects of radiation by the military and the general public are simultaneously comic and tragic to many viewers today. Newsreel footage tells people how long they should wait to determine when the Earth would be inhabitable after an atomic blast. The wait, it is suggested, could be made more tolerable through the use of "tranquilizers— not a drug, and not habit-forming.1,3 Suburban families toyed with the idea of constructing a bomb shelter in lieu of the carport or swimming pool. Food was to be stockpiled for later use, and neighbors were not to be allowed inside a shelter after the blast had occurred— as extra people could reduce a family's likelihood of survivability. In the classroom, school children were instructed by the friendly, animated Tommy the Turtle to "duck 'n cover, cause that flash means you better act fast . . .

3From Atomic Cafe. 9 anytime of the day or night.”4 Tommy the Turtle, digging himself as deep as possible within his own shell, taught by pathetic example how to deal with the threat of atomic warfare in the 1950s. It was possible that the last sight to be seen by mankind might be the mushroom cloud. With a sense of humor, however, some products became available to the consumer: Atomic Brand hot sauce was guaranteed to please the spiciest appetites. The film takes its name from The Atomic Cafe, an actual restaurant, showing that popular culture has absorbed the image of nuclear warfare. At this bar, the Atomic Cocktail was sure to pack an extra punch. One could carry the image to an extreme, and say that the Ajax White Tornado is not too far from the shape of the mushroom cloud. Had dirt truly met its match?

4From Atomic Cafe. HIROSHIMA MON AMOUR

In 1958, director Alain Resnais received money to work on a documentary film on the horrors of the destruction of Hiroshima by the Atomic Bomb. In his book, Alain Resnais. James Monaco discusses the difficulties in bringing the visuals of this to the screen: 1. It is impossible to do a film about the bomb. Resnais was unable to complete a short documentary, but nevertheless had little trouble finishing a longer film that not only included documentary footage, but also told a fictional story— two fictional stories in fact. Marguerite Duras called this approach "false documentary." What are the ethical implications? In short, is this false documentary valid? 2. If Hiroshima. mon Amour is a false documentary (and why not?) then how do audiences react to it? What effect was it supposed to have? What effect does it actually have? What is valid (and both Resnais and Duras obviously thought so), then is it possible to understand a false documentary? You can see, I'm sure, that we are already in the land of philosophical conundrum. The first words of Hiroshima— very important words— are:

HE: You saw nothing in Hiroshima. Nothing. SHE: I saw everything. Everything.1 In dealing with our sense of guilt after the bombing of Hiroshima, and the possibility of additional atomic warfare, we turn once again to literature and film

‘James Monaco, Alain Resnais (New York: Oxford University Press), 36.

10 1 1 to come to grips with our anxiety. As the initial shock of the atrocities committed against the Jews in Nazi Germany subside, we gained knowledge of more personal and cerebral expression of that injustice through such works as The Diarv of Anne Frank, for example. We learn to deal with the horrors of the Nazi death camps through literature and film. Spencer R. Weart discusses the early works that attempted to artistically express these anxieties in his book, Nuclear Fear: A few psychologists who studied nuclear fear warned that the world public, like the Frank family, was shutting its eyes to the human forces that could destroy it. People who tried to understand our situation hesitated when they found that the investigation led them on a frightening journey into themselves. Failure to control the murderous hostility of others was terrifying enough, but what of our own desires? This was of course the bond joining the mad scientist with the monster, a theme of hundreds of works associated with "control" of nuclear energy. Yet most works preferred to project those feelings outward, assigning them to atomic scientists, Cold War generals, or Russians. Very few works associated the theme with universal circumstances.2 As the experience of a young Jewish woman hiding from the Nazi terror gave us a human and focused picture of life for Jews in Nazi Germany, Hiroshima. mon Amour gave a personal view of Eastern and Western horrors of war of the two combat theaters of the Second World War

2Spencer R. Weart, Nuclear Fear: A History of Images (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1988), 411. 12 together in a personal and experiential point of view. In discussing her novel, Marguerite Duras explains the adjustment we as humans had to make in order to bring this fear to a level of discussion: If is allegorical. In short, an operatic exchange. Impossible to talk about Hiroshima. All one can do is talk about the impossibility of talking about Hiroshima. The knowledge of Hiroshima being stated a priori by an exemplary delusion of the mind.3 Duras' novel and Resnais' adaptation allow us to see the horrors of the blast, and frame them in the context of a fictional story. We watch it not as a picture of human suffering on a newsreel, but we feel it, as the characters do, in a human, dramatic context. As drama is a form of catharsis, we search to exorcise our fears.

3Marguerite Duras, quoted by James Monaco, Alain Resnais (New York: Oxford University Press, 1978), 37. ALTERED STATES

This film chronicles the experiences of a scientist who experiments with altered states of consciousness. His experiments bring him face to face with his deepest fears. Among them is nuclear warfare. In a hallucination sequence he experiences nuclear destruction, and images of the mushroom cloud are utilized. In Altered States (Ken Russell, 1979 from a novel by Paddy Chayevski), a scientist searches for a route to the primordial self, tracing back through evolution to find the moment when life began (with the help of a warped science of isolation tanks, an Inca hallucinogenic and a high-tech monitor). The scientist takes a de-escalating tour through the evolutionary scale, reaching the point of the one-celled beginnings of nature (a lot of territory to cover in any film's running time). William Hurt and Blair Brown, as anthropologists, are our "cursed by brilliance" tour guides through a variety of hallucinations, pagan rituals, and Ken Russell's special effects. The quest for knowledge becomes a possibly one-way trip to life as a one-celled

13 14 organism. Brown, though gifted and thoughtful, is a slave to the rules of science— substantiate claims, weigh the experiment to the control, and collect the raw data. She is the control. Hurt, on the other hand, disavows his training as an impartial collector of information. He himself becomes the experiment, and should his methods prove wrong, he remains in a state other than human. With the introduction of the matter-altering mushrooms provided at an Inca ritual (a clear inference of the atomic blast shape), the impartial quality of his work is replaced by the quest for the "truth"— a glimpse at the origin of life. He is, in a sense a prophet in reverse— seeking a moment of divine intervention in pre-history. Spencer Weart discusses this psychological parallel between the mushroom shape and the nuclear blast: Themes of transmutation and the sacred showed an astonishing affinity for nuclear energy, turning up in all sorts of curious places, giving nuclear imagery an inner force that few recognized. There were examples less transparent than flying saucers, and more important. One of these was the most impressive of all nuclear symbols, found in the great majority of nuclear films, books, pamphlets, and at first sight seemingly entirely straightforward: a towering white cloud. In the late 1970s the psychologist Michael Carey found that photographs of these clouds had made an unforgettable impression on nearly everyone he interviewed, imparting a vision of overwhelming and numinous power. As Pravda remarked, the "mushroom shaped cloud" seemed to hang "suspended over the future of humankind." Why mushroom-shaped? Other words could have been chosen. Observers of the first Trinity test wrote of 15 the "multi-colored surging cloud," the "giant column," the "chimney-shaped column," the "dome-shaped" column, the "parasol," the "great funnel," the "geyser," the "convoluting brain," and even the "raspberry." A Japanese witness of the Hiroshima explosion described a "pillar of black smoke shaped like a parachute," and a Bikini test in 1946 was aptly described as a "cauliflower" cloud. Yet at Bikini a reporter also spoke of "the mushroom, now the common symbol of the atomic age," and the term or its equivalent in other languages became almost synonymous with nuclear bombs. Already at the Trinity tests more observers had mentioned mushrooms than anything else. Somehow it was hard to imagine people feeling the same awe for a "cauliflower cloud." The traditional symbolism of fungi was studied in the 1950s by a respected scholar, R. G. Wasson. He noted that in Western culture mushrooms were usually associated with dank, dark places, rot and poison, and, in short, death. But if that was all that people had in mind at bomb tests, they could have used the English term specifically for poisonous fungi, namely, "toadstool." Wasson also pointed out that mushrooms were also associated with food, and therefore life. The mysteriously swift growth of these organisms was part of their folklore, and indeed descriptions of the Trinity test spoke of the cloud not only as a static shape but equally often as something that "mushroomed" up. Mushrooms could also shelter life, as in children's book illustrations where they arched protectively like an umbrella over small creatures. The mushroom, whether an atomic bomb cloud or simply a knob growing on a rotting log, could represent life opposing death— perhaps even life arising from within death, that is, transmutation?1 In Altered States, during William Hurt's backward slide toward the original self, he reverts through what is his own past. He re-experiences his father's death, and as his psyche stretches beyond its usual bounds, he dreams of eating sherbet served in champagne glasses, which take on the shape of an atomic blast. The atomic blast that

‘Weart, Nuclear Fear. 16 results forces he and his wife to lay in the desert— and they are transformed into dust, blowing away into nothingness. The fears that exist in most of us concerning the nuclear age are paramount: All that we have done, and the progress of humanity can be erased in an instant. This is a modern example of the nuclear blast symbolism, which shows how the fear of the nuclear holocaust has been ingrained in the mind of the average movie-goer. What was once too horrible to represent visually has been incorporated into a universal horror- one which is incorporated in our subconscious, as well as in our conscious level of day-to-day worries. In the end, what our scientist comes to realize is that the ''truth" that surrounds the source of our humanity is far worse than the conditions we experience in life as ordinary people. The isolation and lack of thought that is the moment when life began is one of loneliness, surrounded by vacuous lack of a divine presence. The nothingness of our beginning is equal to the nothingness we imagine in the end. The message we are given is that we are to make the most of our experience, and that what is the present is what we must preserve. Our past serves us as a 17 teacher, yet we cannot change the method in which our lessons are taught. Although brief, the references to the atomic experience in Altered States are highly poignant: Our world is on the edge of destruction, and we search for answers to explain our arrival at such power over the entire existence of the planet. We can allow ourselves to become paralyzed by our fears— just as a rodent lives in constant fear of predators, or we can conquer our fears, and evolve to a point where we can eliminate the threat to our existence as a world: Ours is indeed an age of extremity. For we live under continual threat of two equally fearful, but seemingly opposed, destinies: unremitting banality and inconceivable terror. It is fantasy, served out in large rations by the popular arts, which allows most people to cope with these twin specters. For one job that fantasy can do is lift us out of the unbearably humdrum and to distract us from terrors— real or anticipated— by an escape into exotic, dangerous situations which have happy last-minute endings. But another of the things that fantasy can do is to normalize what is psychologically unbearable, thereby inuring us to it. In one case, fantasy beautifies the world. In another, it neutralizes it. As the characters of Hiroshima. mon Amour sought love and understanding in the senseless ruins of a civilization, we question our survival and destiny in the threat of the nuclear holocaust.

2Susan Sontag, "The Imagination of Disaster," in Film Theory and Criticism, edited by Gerald Mast and Marshall Cohen (New York: Oxford University Press, 1985). 18 Despite the ongoing discovery of senselessness our murky trip backward through life on the evolutionary scale provides— Ken Russell's Altered States leaves us with hope, and a message for the present as well as the future: To search for peace and joy in our own lives, as we try to control our future. BLADE RUNNER

An emotionally traumatized policeman is called out of retirement to dispose of human replicants, against the backdrop of a post-apocalyptic city. Although not overtly concerned with warfare as a theme, it definitely questions the quality of life possible following nuclear attack, and in our present, technology-based society. The post-Vietnam era of the late 1970s and early 1980s was one of confusion, pessimism, and a sense that something new was "in the wings." Computers were becoming common in the workplace, and gradually became available for the home. On the popular music front, rock and roll and disco were being replaced by the harsh, socially critical sounds of "punk" music. The news echoed the possibility of a fuel shortage. The forecast for the economy stated that the generation coming of age could not hope to live up to the socioeconomic standards they grew up with. There were escalating tensions between the Reagan administration and its fragile relationships in the Middle East and Central America. With that came the threat of war, and possible nuclear attack.

19 20 The post-Vietnam experience can be compared to the post-World War II social climate that sparked the film noir period in American film. In his article "Notes on Film Noir," Paul Schrader lists four elements that characterize the film genre: 1. Post war disillusionment: The post war period was a complicated time, and the U.S. had to deal with the reality of the atomic bomb, the loss of loved ones in the war, and a change in lifestyle. The affluence that would categorize the 1950s had not yet been realized by Americans, and as they sought out their places in society, they felt a sense of the unknown. Also, there was a sort of delayed reaction to the 1930s depression era— people had not had the time to really react to that period, as it was virtually replaced by the tensions leading up to and including the Second World War. 2. Post-war Realism was replacing the pre-war beauty and "The American Way" propaganda. The American audience wanted to see the world on the street, through the eyes of real people, and bring melodrama down to their own level. America had grown tired of the preachy "Americana" that was produced by Hollywood to boost morale during the war years. 3. The German influence: The great advances of the German Expressionist period were being realized. Also, many of the directors who had been so prolific in Germany had fled to the United States to avoid the artistic and religious persecution of Nazi Germany. 4. Hard-boiled tradition: The tough-talking, pessimistic view found in detective novels by Dashiell Hammet, and the tough language of Hemingway, were incorporated into gangster pictures, and later used for the moods, themes, and storylines of film noir.1 The noir tradition can be planted firmly in time— a very early true example, The Maltese Falcon (1941) up through Orson Welles' A Touch of Evil (1958). Nearly

Paraphrased from Paul Schrader, "Notes on Film Noir," Film Comment. Spring 1972, 8-13. 21 every dramatic film from 1941 to 1953 contains some noir elements. There are also foreign offshoots of film noir such as The Third Man (Orson Welles, 1949) and Breathless (Jean-Luc Goddard, 1959).2 The theme of the film noir— the dark, hopeless nature of our existence— is illustrated by films like Tay Garnett's The Postman Always Rinas Twice (1946): the story of a drifter lured by temptation into a love triangle between a depressed and violent restaurant owner and his love-starved wife. Lewis Milestone's The Strange Love of Mother Ivers (1946) examines the problems of a young woman trapped in an unhappy marriage in a small town. Also, Orson Welles' The Ladv from Shanghai (1948), with it£ cryptic plot of murder and its famous scene in the room of mirrors (which exemplifies the elements of light, self introspection and self-loathing) helped typify the noir genre.

Similar issues were embodied in the melancholy mood of such films as Blade Runner thirty-five years later. The film, based on the novel by Philip K. Dick, moves the setting to that of the post-apocalyptic landscape. A human is assigned to destroy genetically engineered replicants that have come to Los Angeles, after

2Ibid., p. 9. 22 escaping slavery as workers on a frontier planet. Replicants are designed to think and perform like human beings, yet they are banned from Earth. The replicants know they are engineered, yet they cannot separate themselves from the human need to be part of a society. The polluted, amber-hued atmosphere is constantly clouded by a noxious atmosphere, and never-ending, toxic rains pound upon Los Angeles in the year 2019. As the protagonist, Deckard (Harrison Ford) seeks to "retire" (kill) the genetically engineered human replicants that have revolted against their creators. In seeking information for his assignment to destroy the replicants, Deckard visits the owner and head scientist of the corporation that engineers the replicants. There, he meets Rachael, an advanced replicant that is programmed for a long life, rather than the four-year span of previous models. In addition to her longevity, Rachael is programmed with the memories of a childhood she never had. Her technological advances bring her many steps closer to being a human— yet she is tragically more pitiful: Her life experiences are nothing more than fiction, yet her experiences motivate her "life."

The film reminds the viewer of Invasion of the Body Snatchers. in that those around us may look like us, 23 but they may be something other than their outward appearance— a sinister, internal difference that can go unnoticed by the casual observer, until the danger is unavoidable. Yet, the film allows a sympathetic view of the replicants to emerge— the realization that they did not choose to be created by man. They envy humans for their sense of completion— memories, motivation, souls: Replicants, because they are not human, are by definition alienated. Memoryless, emotionless, cut off from humans by genetic engineering and by law (human law), replicants seek for some meaning to their lives. Rachael and Leon, for instance, carry photographs to give them the feeling (literally, the impression) that they have a human past; it is a way of giving them memories, which might serve as a good definition of the origin of emotion— the difference between then and now. They are engineered to be identical to humans— and only "blade runners," a trained division of police officers, can determine the existence of a replicant.

The film creates an atmosphere that borrows from Orwellian visions of the future and the hard-boiled tradition of the film noir: Blade Runner borrows significantly from Dick's novel, Fritz Lang's Metropolis, and film noir, all fairly obvious sources which have attracted critical notice. Less obvious, but far more important to understanding the film's redemptive, transcendental vision, is the manner in which Biblical illusions and borrowings from

3David Desser, "Blade Runner: Science Fiction and Transcendence," Literature Film Quarterly 13, no. 3 (1985):175. 24 John Milton's Paradise Lost contribute to the film's deeper mythical structure.4 The film shows a claustrophobic, urban cluster, so cluttered with people and machines that there is no escape from the reminders of the waste that is the byproduct of urban life— and the accompanying moral decay of the inhabitants, as seen in Metropolis. In a fight-to-the-death with the final rhone replicant, Deckard is about to lose. His opponent spares him in the last instant of the fight— a sense that man and replicant can co-exist. This realization is carried further: Blade Runner's resolution centers around man resigning himself to the reality and "self" of his creation. Deckard and Rachael escape the pollution and harshness of the city, romantically involved. That is, Rachael— a replicant— is allowed to exist as a true human being. Deckard and Rachael emerge as hope for the future from the decay of the mechanized, urban squalor: To its credit, Blade Runner resolves its issues within the specific science fiction context it creates. Man merges with its creation. This new Adam and his genetically engineered Eve will become the father and mother of a new species.5 In the final analysis, the viewer can believe that the enemy in Blade Runner is not a man-made monster

4Ibid., 173. 5Ibid., 178. 25 represented by the replicants, rather that man's enemy is the science that has been created, but cannot be controlled. Similarly, the fear of the nuclear holocaust can be viewed not as a fear of country Y annihilating country Z— rather it is the fear of man harnessing energy through science, and then being unable to control his creation. THE ROAD WARRIOR

Life after the nuclear holocaust has been used successfully in a large variety of films— none more successfully than the trilogy of "Mad Max" films. Mad Max. The Road Warrior, and Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome have followed the evolution of the title character in the harsh,post-apocalyptic environment. The first film, Mad Max. is set in the early stages of social decline soon after the nuclear war— at the end of the film, Max loses his wife and child to a band of wandering savages. The Road Warrior picks up the same story line several years later, as Max wanders the desert alone. Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome focuses on the same evolving story, although by this third and final film, the cult film images have become somewhat tired and predictable. The Road Warrior was a film that broke new ground for later films dealing with post-apocalyptic themes. The film, a sequel to Mad Max (1980)which incorporated much of the pessimistic and nihilistic anti-ideals of the punk rock movement of the late 1970s and early 1980s,

'Mad Max. directed by George Miller, with Mel Gibson (American International Pictures, 1980).

26 27 accelerated these themes to virtually create a new genre of action-adventure picture. The film capitalized on fears present in society— nuclear destruction and the resulting breakdown in communication, mechanization, and finally civilization. Max's mutated enemies are the result of exposure to radiation from the nuclear attacks that took place a few years before the start of the picture. The dwindling society that had employed Max as a police officer in Mad Max has deteriorated into a competition for the fuel and vehicles necessary to survival in the world after nuclear warfare. Only the craftiest and most violent are able to endure the harsh environmental and societal decay in the aftermath of the apocalypse. This world plays on the viewers' nightmares of life after nuclear attack. This pushes the questions represented in the documentaries of the 1940s and 1950s many steps further: Instead of asking "Can I survive a nuclear attack?," The Road Warrior asks "Do I really want to survive?" The film begins with the main character, Max (Mel Gibson), wandering through the desert in search of fuel. He comes across a pocket of civilization— a fortressed refinery and compound populated by a group of survivors who cling to the social conformities of the civilized world. This fortress is besieged by a motorcycle gang 28 composed of mutated, violent heathens. Needing fuel, Max strikes a bargain with those inside the fortress to provide a diesel tractor they require for escape in exchange for all the fuel he can take away for himself in one trip. In his reluctant role as saviour of the compound, Max becomes "humanized" and a member of a group— which alters his singularly "survivalistic behavior." Still, like most humans, Max has a need for companionship and a feeling of belonging. Morality, or a normal code of ethics found in present Western culture has crumbled in the aftermath of nuclear war. Max, being solitary and independent, is a prime candidate for life on the scorched landscape. George Miller, the "Mad Max" film trilogy director, discusses the evolution of Max's character in the harsh, post-nuclear world: Although Mad Max depicts a relatively early stage of social collapse, when a few senile institutions are hanging on by their fingernails, the film is governed by a sense that this moribund order is a propped-up, burned-out husk. There is really only clutter and grisly beauty.2 This landscape is almost an exaggeration of that of the classical western film. Throughout The Road Warrior. Max operates in an identical fashion to the western hero in that he is nearly always alone, innately violent, and largely unaware of any other purpose than to survive.

2David Chute, "The Ayatollah of the Moviola," Film Comment. July/August 1982, 27. 29 Despite the hopelessness of his situation, he continues onward due only to his polished survival techniques. Those he helps along the way are helped by a sense of being lucky enough to cross his path. He needs no one, and is needed by many for help. In the midst of his wanderings, Max begrudgingly agrees to assist those in the "civilized11 compound, who struggle against barbaric aggressors. The group inside the refinery mirror the oppressed townspeople so familiar in the typical western, right down to their circular encampment in lieu of the protective circle of covered wagons. The image presented in The Road Warrior of life after nuclear attack is like "the new frontier" of the western. Those made insane or otherwise mutated by radiation are like the hostile Indians of the western— other and different. The Indian in war paint is simply replaced with a mutated savage on a motorcycle. Max, like Ethan Edward in The Searchers, or Shane, does not fit within the micro-society of the frontier civilization, despite the overtures of the group inviting him to become a member. Moreover, Max would rather avoid all contact with the group— if not for his need for fuel to maintain his solitary existence. Max is not only in competition with the marauding savages— he is in conflict with himself; part of him yearns to be part of the 30 civilization, yet another, equally powerful force drives him to roam alone. Max has not overcome the loss of his wife and child, as seen at the end of the first film in the trilogy. Max's contact with civilization makes him aware of an obligation to societal and familial arrangements, despite his drive for solitary living. In the climactic chase scene of The Road Warrior. Max is chased by the mutated motorcycle gang as he alone drives the tank truck across the desert. The civilized members of the compound take a parallel route in a school bus. They have hidden their fuel inside the bus, and used the tanker, loaded with sand— and Max— as decoys. Max crashes, and is left for dead by the motorcycle gang, who discover the counterfeit cargo. Seriously injured, Max ends as he began at the start of the film: alone, without fuel, wandering the desert. A recurring question raised throughout the film centers around Max's need to be alone in the barren wasteland: Why does he reject the group's offers for him to become a member of the society? Clearly, some of the answers lie in the storyline of Mad Max. the first film in the trilogy. His wife and child were brutally murdered by the gang, and left him bitter toward all people. Still, the viewer gets the idea that the decay of good will in all individuals is a result of the decline of the 31 civilized culture. Perhaps Max feels that the decay is cerebral as well as physical— that no person is to be relied upon. The living conditions force everyone to be ruled by their survival skills, and not by their hearts. We have proof of this, in that Max was used only as decoy for the group in the compound. (Yet, had he become a member of that society earlier on— become an actual part of their hierarchy, would he have been treated more fairly?) His nature as presented in the film points in the direction of his solitary lifestyle, in any case. Beyond parallels with the classical western, The Road Warrior also draws on the familiar with its concerns for modern society. The film's structure is rooted in actual events and concerns at the time of its production— although made in Australia, the film makes reference to an actual problem facing society in the 1980s. The time was one of pessimism due to international tensions and unrest. The Iranian hostage crisis, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, and uncertain political alliances in Central America were issues challenging western society. A global fuel crisis was the impetus for the storyline of The Road Warrior, and such a crisis was evolving in Australia in the 1980s. 32 In an interview with film scholar David Chute, director George Miller discusses his inspiration for the Mad Max series of films: . . . neither Mad Max or Road Warrior are speculative about the future, though. It's a lot of stuff that is clearly exaggerated from the present. There was petrol rationing in Australia then, and it was surprising how quickly things disintegrated. After three or four days there was always some sort of aggression at the petrol queues. People's normal lifestyle was threatened, and they were suddenly going after each other.3 What is said of The Road Warrior can be said of earlier science fiction films. Star Wars is referred to by some as a "space western," with its chase scenes, and the bar in the badlands with its assortment of outlaws and outcasts. Perhaps this is indicative of the direction in which large-scale films have gone: Escalating costs have arrested the development of new genres, and old, successful formulas are changed enough to make them seem new.

Commercial film making is like cooking— a slight change in the ingredients results in what seems like a whole new recipe. In the end, it is still basically formed from the same dough. Still, The Road Warrior presents some important questions about life after nuclear war. Questions about

3George Miller, interview by David Chute, in "The Ayatollah of the Moviola," Film Comment. 33 the quality of life of those who survive and the levels of possible societal decay are intriguing and important. It is not a film to be labeled as exploitative or dismissed for gratuitous violence. The television series "Star Trek" called space "the final frontier." The final frontier may be that of Earth after a nuclear blast. Although placed within the western framework, the film raises new ideas about what will happen in a wild land that is caused by warfare. TESTAMENT

Although action/adventure films of the early 1980s address the theme of nuclear destruction, there are other, more personal films that deal with the same subject matter. Testament (directed and produced by Lynn Litman) achieves what had been sought after by so many films that portray the nuclear holocaust— a portrayal of the realization of the end of the mechanized world, as seen through the eyes of ordinary people— a family's slow revelation about the effects of nuclear war. Their experience is not that of a grandiose horror that wipes the Earth clean of life in one strike. Instead, they are consumed by the slow, insidious forces of radioactivity that lead to their eventual end. Carol Weatherly (Jane Alexander) is the mother of an imperfect family: Carol's husband, Tom (William Devane), is overbearing and crude; her children are sloppy slaves to the VCR who whine continually about their lack of cable television; her house is cluttered with the debris of busy, careless residents. Her life is a fast- paced, average existence that reflects the modern American

34 35 family: Tom and Carol work to meet the challenge which faces their household in the modern economy, yet they cling to traditional values. They pursue physical fitness, responsible work habits, and family activity against the backdrop of the over-mechanized society in which they live. The film opens with Carol Weatherly sprawled lethargically on her bed, struggling to rouse herself to start the day, as she is bombarded by an aerobic exercise program on the TV. The scene subtly conveys the character's feeling of wanting to belong— to be fit, energetic, and successful— like the images presented in the media. The loss of identity and individualism that people have is somehow absorbed through the stereotypes of success, health, and appearance that advertising challenges each of us to become.

The Weatherly's youngest son (played by Lukas Haas of Witness fame) sits surrounded by the trappings of the modern world— a boom box cassette player, a phonograph, and a television showing Sesame Street— operating simultaneously. Human contact and interaction is portrayed as a lost occurrence in modern society, even in children's education and play. The Weatherly family (presumably like many others) tries to maintain the small town lifestyle, although they 36 represent a cross-section of the urban and suburban lifestyles they have tried to shelter themselves from. Her husband commutes to San Francisco, and she works at the local school. They keep their ties to the small, remote Northern California community strong. They are active in their community and care about their neighbors. Carol and her husband are friends with the Japanese gas station owner and his Down Syndrome-afflicted son, Hiroshi. They are active in their church, and friends with the town elders, the Aphants who live in a big house on a hill. The day of the nuclear attack begins much like any other day for the family. The children attend school, Jane Alexander goes to work, and the husband makes his usual commute to work. In the afternoon the children and Jane Alexander sit in the living room. Jane Alexander is on the phone attempting to arrange dinner plans with her husband. The children sit glued to the television, complaining heartily about how "the other kids have cable.” There is interference on the television, and the oldest son leans out the window to adjust the rooftop antenna. The program is interrupted about news of a nuclear strike. The transmission is cut off, and the room is flooded like over-exposed photographs with the heat flash of a nuclear blast in the distant city. 37 The townspeople assemble at the home of their friends the Aphants,1 who have a HAM radio in their home. They learn of the complete devastation of the cities to their North and South, and learn that lack of contact signifies total destruction. The town hopes to carry on as a community— against the dreary, dead sky and gray plant life. The first sign of illness is when a young neighbor's baby rejects her breast milk. The community has no instruments for measuring radiation, and can only guess at the dangers outside. Jane Alexander takes in Hiroshi after his father, the gas station owner, dies of radiation poisoning. She buries her youngest son, her daughter, and survives only with her eldest boy and Hiroshi. She prepares herself and her children for suicide by carbon monoxide poisoning in the garage with the car running. She is not able to carry through with the plan at first, as it seems the act of suicide is acknowledging defeat, and signifies an irreverence for life itself. In the end, the woman and her children eat graham crackers spread with poison, with

JAn unusual name choice for fictional characters. The Oxford English Dictionary has no heading under the word 'aphant,' but there is a listing for the apheta. Apheta is "the giver of life in the nativity," or the act of divine conception. English astrologer and philosopher William Lilly (1602-1681) used the word as a signifier of doom— "You may always import a danger of death, when you find the Apheta come to the hostile Beams of the killing planet." 38 birthday candles on top— celebrating their freedom from the horrors they have endured. She asks them to remember what horrors they were able to survive, and to hope for a better chance for mankind the second time around. One of the most memorable moments in the film occurs during the performance of an elementary school play, fairly early in the film. The show, selected for performance before the nuclear attack, is presented to the parents a few days after the blast. Ironically, the children dramatize the Pied Piper of Hamelin. chosen because of the film's fictitious location, Hamelin, California. The Reader's Encyclopedia explains the legend this way: According to the legend, the town of Hamelin was plagued with rats in 1824. A mysterious stranger in parti-colored clothes appeared and offered to rid the town of the destructive vermin for a specified sum of money. The leaders of the town agreed to the contract, and the stranger began to play his pipe. The rats came swarming from the buildings and followed him to the river Wesser, where they were drowned. But then the town leaders refused to make the payment, so the Pied Piper returned once more playing his pipe. Only this time it was the children of the town he enchanted and lured away to vanish behind a door in the Koppenburg hill.2

The play is given by battery-operated lantern light, in the dark auditorium. Images of the folktales of ancient times, told around the campfire, arise. There is a

2Stephen Benet, The Reader's Encyclopedia (New York: Thomas Crowell and Company, 1965). 39 macabre feeling that the legend has somehow come true. The strangers in bright clothes are those who we have fought in battle or aligned with in tenuous treaties for personal gain. The result of these flimsy binds is Nuclear War. Humankind has broken its contract to itself: Through the militaristic advances and final act of nuclear war, it has neglected its vows to protect the world for future generations. As the performance comes to a close, the child who plays the Piper explains the fate of the children:

Your children are not dead . . . they are only waiting until the world deserves them. CONCLUSION

As the films used in this paper have discussed, the nuclear blast has come to represent the end. We have gotten to the point where the fear of surviving can be addressed, as demonstrated by The Road Warrior and Testament. We can see how these fears are illustrated in the hallucination sequence of Altered States. Blade Runner questions the escalation of technology— and asserts that technology can better endure nuclear warfare than the spirit of those humans who survive. What then can be determined from the use of such images? In 1990, MTV still showed a multitude of music video, and promoted what was called "The Last Request Weekend." Viewers were invited to call the network to request what videos they would like to see if it were their last weekend on Earth. The symbolism used to illustrate the premise was that of a nuclear blast— the mushroom cloud.

In 1990, the cherished filmmaker Akira Kurosawa's film Rhapsody in August is in production. It is the story

40 41 of a Japanese family's experience during the atomic blasts of World War II.1 What is important to remember is that fears about nuclear destruction are simply an addendum to the fears that existed before the Manhattan project— the Bible predicts the end of the world, and other forms of Armageddon have been discussed for centuries. A basic fear that surrounds the issue of nuclear war is the idea that it takes but one individual to launch a missile. One can start the war: The theme of the cosmic secret is a good starting place, for here, the historical, social, and psychological forces were all plain. The tradition behind the theme was familiar; tales about dangerous secrets were common among native peoples around the world. Western culture had Adam and Eve, Prometheus, Eurydice, Lot's wife, Bluebeard's wife, the sorcerer's apprentice, and a thousand more who came to grief by grasping after forbidden knowledge. The Christian apocalypse itself would begin when the book of seven seals, which no man is worthy to open, is unsealed (Revelation 5:1-4). In this tradition the medieval Catholic Church, thinking it sinful to pry too far into God's mysteries, distrusted alchemy, while the alchemists themselves wrote endlessly about their perilous secret.2 Is nuclear energy that perilous secret? Is this the seventh seal? That point is certainly a debate that could involve a vast amount of paper through argument. What is clear is the message that the fear of humankind is

•Steven Weisman, "Kurosawa is Sailing Unfamiliar Seas," New York Times. 1 October 1990, C13-C14. 2Weart, Nuclear Fear. 55. 42 not new, and not a result of the presence of nuclear energy. Nuclear energy is but a mamnade addition to the possible forms of total destruction. In a sense this entire study could be written off at face value (A gun represents death, so what?). Still, the power of the atomic blast as a symbol of destruction remains powerful. Television has perhaps anesthetized viewers to the power of guns— yet the atomic blast evokes a sense of anxiety and finality in the viewer that remains potent. The idea of transmutation is, in scientific terms, defined this way: A chemical atom takes on the properties of another type of atom. Radioactive elements are those in a state of flux— changes in the nucleus result in emission of atomic particles. Transmutation in nature is the evolution of one species into another— simplistically, an ape takes on the characteristic of early man. In a sense, the man-made atomic weapon takes on the characteristics of the mushroom cloud. Spencer Weart discusses this idea at great length in Nuclear Fear: A History of Images, with great eloquence and intelligence. A fungus, a living thing that takes life from the decay of organic matter. As rational adults, we know that the mushroom cloud is not in actuality a living entity. Still, I believe that this image of life living off the spoils of death remains 43 somewhere within the psyche of many individuals. I do not profess to be a psychologist, nor do I invite a scientist to delve into this question at any great depth. I raise the point to illustrate once more the potency of the atomic blast imagery. The purpose of this study has been neither to condemn nor to condone atomic and nuclear energy. The anxiety it has created, and the manner in which that anxiety has been represented in film is the focus of this paper. Although the tensions facing the United States have changed considerably over the years historically— the threat over the Cold War of the 1950s and 1960s took a back seat to the tensions of the War in Vietnam in the late 1960s, yet emerged once again as a threat in the 1980s. As the Cold War subsided with the emergence of Gorbachev and Glastnost in 1990, and the breakdown of the Iron Curtain, the tensions of the Persian Gulf mounted. Throughout these years, the fear of nuclear war has remained a concern of the American people. Despite the world tension of a given time, the fear of nuclear warfare has remained a constant.

In closing, I defer once more to Spencer Weart, who closes his book this way:

Perhaps the best response has come from people I have not mentioned in this book, people who did not bother with nuclear imagery. They knew the lesson of fallout and missiles: that we must see everything as linked 44 together, and that the destiny of citizens of Moscow is the destiny of citizens of New York and of generations to come and even the fish in the sea. But they understood that to reach a union we do not need to tear open vast, angry secrets (except perhaps our own ones), that to live we do not need to destroy. Such people, whether artists or scientists or ordinary citizens, setting aside their fears of nuclear energy and their fantasies of magic transmutation, work directly to help us understand the world, to cherish it, and to improve it.3

3Ibid., 420. BIBLIOGRAPHY

Baker, Paul R., ed. The Atomic Bomb: The Great Decision. 2d ed. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1976. Benet, William Rose. The Reader's Encyclopedia. New York: Thomas Crowell, 1965. Chute, David. "The Ayatollah of the Moviola." Film Comment. July/August 1982, 26-32. Corrigan, Timothy. A Short Guide to Writing About Film. Glenview, Illinois: Scott Foresman and Company, 1988. Desser, David. "Blade Runner: Science Fiction and Transcendence." Literature Film Quarterly 13, no. 3 (1985):172-86. Duras, Marguerite. Hiroshima. Mon Amour. New York: Folio Service, 1960.

Glass, Fred. Article title not available. Film Forum. 23. Jungk, Robert. Brighter Than a Thousand Suns. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1970.

Mast, Gerald. A Short History of the Movies. 4th ed. New York, London: Macmillan Publishing Company, 1986. Monaco, James. Alain Resnais. New York: Oxford University Press, 1978. Prinns, Gwinn, ed. The Nuclear Crisis Reader. New York: Vintage Books/Random House, 1984. Roth, Lane. "Vraisemblance and the Western Setting in Contemporary Science Fiction Film." Literature Film Quarterly 13, no. 3 (1985): 180-185. Schrader, Paul. "Notes on Film Noir." Film Comment (Spring 1972):8-13.

45 46 Sontag, Susan. "The Imagination of Disaster." In Film Theory and Criticism. 451-465. Edited by Gerald Mast and Marshall Cohen. New York: Oxford University Press, 1985. Sterritt, David. "The Road Warrior" (Review). Christian Science Monitor. 2 September 1982, 18. Weart, Spencer R. Nuclear Fear: A History of Images. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1988. Weisman, Steven. "Kurasawa is Sailing Unfamiliar Seas." New York Times. 1 October 1990, C13-C14. FILMOGRAPHY

Altered States. Directed by Ken Russell. With William Hurt, Blair Brown, Charles Haid. Warner Brothers, 1980. The Atomic Cafe. Archives Project, Inc., 1982. Blade Runner. Directed by Ridley Scott. With Harrison Ford, Rutger Hauer, Sean Young, M. Emmet Walsh, and Joanna Cassidy. Warner Brothers, 1982. Brazil. Directed by Terry Gilliam. With Jonathan Pryce, Kim Greist, and Robert De Niro. Universal, 1985. Dr. Stranaelove. Directed by Stanley Kubrick. With Peter Sellers, George C. Scott, Sterling Hayden, and Keenan Wynn. MGM, 1964. Hiroshima. Mon Amour. Directed by Alain Resnais. With Emmanuelle Riva, Elji Okada, and Bernard Fresson. Argo: Pathe, 1959. Metropolis. Directed by Fritz Lang. With Brigitte Helm and Alfred Abel. UFA, 1926. Mad Max. Directed by George Miller. With Mel Gibson. American International Pictures, 1980. Modern Times. Directed by Charles Chaplin. With Charles Chaplin and Paulette Goddard. United Artists, 1936.

Road Warrior. Directed by George Miller. With Mel Gibson. Warner Brothers, 1982. Sleeper. Directed by Woody Allen. With Woody Allen, Diane Keaton, and John Beck. United Artists, 1973. Testament. Directed by Lynn Litman. With Jane Alexander and William Devane. Paramount, 1983.