Kathryn Bigelow hits back after Pentagon criticises ‘A House of Dynamite’ over alleged inaccuracies
Kathryn Bigelow has responded to complaints by the Pentagon about her new Netflix movie, A House of Dynamite.
The film, which landed on the streaming platform on October 24th, features an all-star cast including Idris Elba, Rebecca Ferguson, Jared Harris, and Tracy Letts.
In A House of Dynamite, which is a work of fiction that explores how government officials react amid the launch of a nuclear missile, they fail to prevent the missile strike on Chicago despite launching ground-based interceptor missiles from Alaska.
The Pentagon then responded to the controversial scene in an internal memo made by the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) on October 16th, which was later obtained by Bloomberg.
The memo states that “the fictional interceptors in the movie miss their target and we understand this is intended to be a compelling part of the drama intended for the entertainment of the audience” and testing carried out by The Pentagon “tell a vastly different story.”
It also claims that the missile interceptors “have displayed a 100% accuracy rate in testing for more than a decade”.
Now, in response to the criticism, Bigelow has defended A House of Dynamite, telling The Hollywood Reporter, “I just state the truth. In this piece, it’s all about realism and authenticity. Same with Zero Dark Thirty and same with Hurt Locker — even though Hurt Locker was obviously a work of fiction, and this is a work of fiction. “
The director continued, “For me, these are pieces that lean in hard on realism. You’re inviting an audience into, say, the battledeck of STRATCOM. That’s a place that’s not easily accessible, and so you want it to be authentic and honest. That’s my goal, and I think we achieved it.”
Bigelow also said her aims for the movie is to begin a wider conversation surrounding nuclear weapons in society, sharing, “We live in A House of Dynamite. The unthinkable – it’s time to address it and, in a perfect world, begin discussions about reducing the nuclear stockpile.”
A House of Dynamite, which was nominated for the ‘Golden Lion’ at the Venice Film Festival, has been watched by more than 20 million people since arriving on Netflix and storming the chart.
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