Recommendations of the Editorial team
At first it’s just a small dot on a screen. A rocket rising somewhere in the Pacific. Routine for the US military, almost always it is not a real threat. But then it becomes increasingly clear that an intercontinental ballistic missile loaded with nuclear missiles is heading directly towards the American mainland. 19 minutes to respond.
The nightmare scenario of “A House Of Dynamite” is likely to scare many Netflix viewers. The new film by adrenaline expert Kathryn Bigelow can be seen there just a few weeks after its theatrical release. The film shows three times how time runs out mercilessly and how helpless the security authorities and even the US President react to prevent the end of the world.
The harrowing, masterfully directed film shows no mercy, even if it deliberately does not show crucial details. Shouldn’t there be missile defense? Yes, but she fails in “A House Of Dynamite”. One rocket fails, another misses the target. As the film coolly states, “It’s like trying to hit a bullet with another bullet.”
Pentagon angry over “A House Of Dynamite”
The Missile Defense Agency (MDA), the US agency subordinate to the Pentagon that controls the national missile defense system, is angry about the portrayal in the hyper-realistic thriller. $50 billion cost for a hit rate of 61 percent? “Bloomberg” speaks of an internal memo in which it is angrily rejected that US missile defense is considered too expensive and ineffective – as “A House Of Dynamite” suggests.
The memo literally says: “The fictional interceptor missiles in the film miss their target. We understand that this is intended as a dramatic element to entertain the audience, but the results from real tests tell a completely different story.” In other words, the United States’ actual deterrence capabilities would be underestimated.
In the memo, the MDA speaks of a guaranteed “100 percent hit rate”, proven in several tests over decades. “The costs are high, but nowhere near as high as the costs if a nuclear missile were to hit our country.”
However, “Bloomberg” also quotes a physicist named Laura Grego (from the US think tank Union of Concerned Scientists), who reports on tests in which the hit rate was well below 100 percent. Apart from that, according to the scientist, the scenario presented in the film is the “simplest scenario imaginable”.
“A House Of Dynamite” is intended as a warning. Even before the film starts, a text panel makes it clear that for the first time since the end of the Cold War, the number of nuclear weapons is increasing again and there are more actors who could use them.