Ppresented in competition at the last Venice Film Festival, A House of Dynamite is streaming on Netflix from today 24 October. This is the latest film by Kathryn Bigelow – the only woman to have won an Oscar for directing, in 2009 for The Hurt Locker. With AHOD, arrived after 8 years of hiatus, Bigelow he stages with splendid mastery of the film medium a Fast-paced political thriller full of subtle tension. A film with multiple centers and characters – including those played by Idris Elba and Rebecca Ferguson – about a sudden state of real war of which the United States and its military institutions are the victims. And consequently the whole world.
A House of Dynamite: Netflix film plot by Kathryn Bigelow streaming. Title meaning
The story begins with the launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) headed for the United States, missile without an identified launch point but coming from Asia. The impact is calculated to last 18 minutes, the affected area is that of Chicago. This exceptional emergency situation is explored from three different but united points of viewin the sense that those involved participate in the same extraordinary meeting – via Zoom – as generals, government officials and the President of the United States.
The director thus creates three segments that blend into each other, each of which brings the trajectory of the missile to a conclusion – without showing the impact. A gimmick which, in addition to other hypotheses, adds that the attack could be a hacker fantasy, a bit like the war games of Wargames. In reality, avoiding the explosion, the deaths, the holocaust, and underlining the management of the crisis several times, is to better define the meaning of this sophisticated dynamite house of the title. A warehouse of useless bombs despite the sophisticated means of control, interception and response. The more we arm ourselves to the teeth, Bigelow says, the weaker we are. From the chain of command to someone who finds an effective and simple way to hit us. Like the Louvre thieves with an electric ladder in broad daylight.
Idris Elba in “A House of Dynamite”. (Netflix)
The protagonists of these three intersected planes I’m Fort Greely personnel – defense center in Alaska -, an outpost that detects the missile believing it to be a test and then instead understands that it is a real threat. Captain Olivia Walker (Rebecca Ferguson) who coordinates operations from the White House Situation Room, and that she has a husband and son to whom she must tell them to escape to the countryside. Secretary of Defense Reid Baker (Jared Harris), to whom the situation progressively causes him to lose lucidity, also because he discovers that his daughter is in Chicago.
And the President of the United States (Idris Elba), who must make a critical decisionbut above all definitiveon the counteroffensive to be adopted. Without having a certain enemy (which could be one hundred thousand: who to hit). Meanwhile, a selection of people including i officials Cathy Rogers (Moses Ingram) and Anna Park (Greta Lee) take refuge in an underground bunker in Pennsylvania.
Rebecca Ferguson. (Netflix)
The review: a very high tension political thriller
Rigorous author always interested in investigate power, violence, and moral tension within American institutions and contemporary conflicts, with A House of Dynamite Kathryn Bigelow he confirms the mastery of constructing a tense, lucid and profoundly political narrative. The film is in fact a thriller that eschews spectacular excess in favor of a dry, almost documentary style. Where every shot becomes a control and observation device.
Looking for a subtly hypnotic realismBigelow reverses the action into tense introspection through direction clinic. An approach that does not attenuate but rather amplifies disorientation. From a formal point of view, A House of Dynamite And a lucid work and ruthlesswith a bare and bruised photograph, combined with a sound design which builds a growing sense of claustrophobia. A fragmented structure that replicates the disorder of a system on the verge of collapse.
A House of Dynamite it is therefore a rigorous and measured work that invites geopolitical reflection on global command lines – political, military, technological. Lines that appear now increasingly confused and uncontrollable. The ending, deliberately ambiguous, condenses all the contemporary chaos into a handful of shots. Turning the imminent threat of a missile into one broader reflection on the fragility of power and on the illusion of control.
The cast of A House of Dynamite: from Idris Elba to Rebecca Ferguson
Another strong point of the film is the very rich cast which contributes decisively to the tension. The very good Idris Elba emerges as the central figure. His portrayal of President is measured and intensewithout pathos.
English actor famous for the series LutherElba recently finished filming his first film as director, Above the Below. The story is that of a trio of astronauts who find themselves trapped in a capsule slowly sinking into the ocean. Isolated and without communications, they must fight for survival in a hostile and claustrophobic environment.
Another fundamental pivot of A House of Dynamite And the Swedish Rebecca Ferguson, who embodies the figure of Captain Walker with clarity and firmness. A figure calibrated and never over the top. After a lot of hard work, Rebecca is now an actress known even to the less specialized public. She became known in 2013 thanks to the TV series The White Queenhe then alongside Tom Cruise in three chapters of Mission: Impossible (respectively Rogue Nation, Fallout And Dead Reckoning). He just finished shooting the third chapter of Dunes and the film adaptation of the TV series Peaky Blinders.