Monday, October 25, 1982
Daily Nebraskan
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Schoolkids learn to cover their heads in case of atomic bombs.
Photos couresty of Plaza 4 Theaters
"Atomic Cafe" exposes secure illusion
By Eric Peterson
"Atomic Cafe," a skillfully funny film that started
Friday, is stitched together from old newsreels and
Army training films on nuclear weapons. Produced and
directed by Kevin Rafferty, Jayne Loader and Pierce
Rafferty, it has elements of both "Hiroshima Von
Amour," which considered suffering in a stark and sensi
tive way, and "Leave it to Beaver," the show which
symbolizes the awful complacence of the '50s.
In fact, Hugh Beaumont, the late actor who played
the all-wise but stupid father, Ward Cleaver in that series,
T ' Movie
feN Review
appears in this film to soothe people's fears about nuclear
disaster. "Risk is part of the pattern of daily life," he
reasons. JVhy, you can be hurt in any number of ways.
You can fall and hit your head in the shower.
Near the start of "Atomic Cafe," we see some of the
footage taken right after Hiroshima was hit. The excru
ciating effect is heightened by the voice-overs in which
Americans make light of the incident. This part of the
film is necessary background against which to set the
illusion of security that Americans tried to preserve in
the years following Hiroshima, an illusion which is cen
tral to the film.
All this was a plan to relieve Americans of tjieir fears
about nuclear apocalypse. Ward Cleaver, former Ne
braska Governor Val Peterson and Bert the Turtle
("Duck! and cover!" he tells school kids) were all called
into service. In an Army propaganda film, a "chaplain"
with hilariously wooden acting, comforts scared soldiers
who are about to watch a test blast by describing the
aesthetic aspect of the mushroom cloud. "Watched from
a safe distance, this explosion is probably one of the
most beautiful things ever seen by man."
The trivialization of nuclear weapons was, of course,
a way of not thinking about them. The film's title comes
from a diner of that name, and there are various Donular
songs about atomic-powered lovers and an "atomic
cocktail" that fizzes over. Various models of bomb
shelters are advertised. One of those ("subversive")
Columbia professors steps in with the truth: (In a nuclear
blast, bomb shelters would be centers of incineration),
but the VS. government continued to insist on the
efficacy of children ducking under their school desks.
The saddest part of the film begins with, faintly
humorous reminders of the McCarthy Redbaiting era.
FBI agents poke around Whittaker Chamber's pumpkin
patch, producing a microfilm which Nixon brandishes,
proclaiming, "I have in my hand a microfilm . . ." (No
documentarist was there the day in West Virginia when
McCarthy began his reign of innuendo with the lie,
("I have in my hand a list . . . ")
But the tone immediately becomes sober when we
recognize Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, executed for
espionage in 1953. Heartbreaking music plays as their
death is described. The observer tells of how Ethel Rosen
berg took several minutes to die, then righteously adds
that she had some accounting to do with God. The
segment finished with a scene of row upon row of su
burban houses, the "little boxes made of ticky-tacky"
to which the Rosenbergs were sacrificed.
This consumer-products world has a very dark under
side. A priest, deadly serious, advises getting a gun, in
case people try to break into your bomb shelter just
before the bomb hits.
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Put Spec Guist
SUHDAY, KOVETilBER 14
8:00P1-PIflSIii::GAU0IT0niU
TICKETS ON SALE NOW!
MO.OO Advance - M1.G3 Day of Show
Tickets available at Pershing Auditorium Box Office, Dirt
Cheap Records, both Pckles Records, both Nebraska Unions,
all Brandeis locations, tickets by mail send self addressed
stamped envelope with cashiers check or money order to
Pershing Auditorium, P.O. Box 81 126. Lincoln. NE 68501 . (In
clude 50 per order hanclng charge) Charge tickets by phone
471-7500. Tickets may be subject to a handling charge.
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Inventor takes shelter in bomb-proof box.
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UNL Opera Theatre presents
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Featuring song9 from Westside Story,
Gypsy, Company and A Little Night Music.
ttuslc end Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim
October 28-30 at 8pm October 31 at 3pm
Regular $7$5 Students & Children $5$3
Kimball Performing Arts Series presents
THE FELB BALLET
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November 5, 6 & 7 at 8 pm
Regular Admission $1 2 $1 0 UNL Students $7 $5
This program it supported to part by tunding from lha Nebraska Arts
Council and tha National Endowment tor lha Arts Dance Touring Program
aa coordinated by the Mid-America Arts AHiance
KIMBALL
HALL11&R
Boi Office 111-5
113 Music BWg, 11th A R
472-3375
ErVrUrt.vtrttY
VU iincoln
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