Death by Lightning (5/5 Stars)

“Death By Lighting” is a miniseries, streaming on Netflix, about the unlikely election and unfortunate assassination of James A. Garfield. Whenever anyone decries the state of movies and bemoans that great movies of the past couldn’t possibly be made in the present, it is perhaps helpful to point out a mini-series such as this, which is an example of a very good cinema that would have been impossible to produce as recently as fifteen years ago.

This miniseries is four episodes of approximately 50 minutes each, so around 3 hours and 20 minutes long. It consists mainly of talking (so a focus on writing and acting), there being only one real action scene, which takes place in the last thirty minutes. Before digital and streaming, a running of 3 hours 20 minutes needed to be an epic movie. There needs to be a great deal of spectacle in order to keep an audience in the seats for that amount of time. We can bemoan the decline of movie theaters, but at the same time, this is something that wouldn’t fit in a movie theater. For the first 100 years of movie history, there wasn’t any long form drama outside of television, which was generally an inferior product, interspersed as it is with commercials and prone to inefficient storytelling due to the perverse incentive to maximise the amount/length of episodes and thus the amount of advertisements shown.

The advent of digital/streaming makes a miniseries like “Death by Lightning” possible. It is longer than most movies, but it is also much cheaper than most epics. (Indeed, because of digital movie-making, it is a bit cheaper than a two hour movie would have been in the 1990s). The exception that was HBO has become the rule. You can watch the whole thing at once (if you wanted to), but the product is best consumed over the course of 2-4 nights. And it is as long as it needs to be, no longer because there isn’t a commercial incentive (i.e. the product is paid for by advertisers) to draw it out unnecessarily.

Because it is cheap to film drama (just writing and acting) and cheap to stream it outside of theaters, Netflix is allowed to take chances on a not-so-obvious subject matter. President Garfield was assassinated within three months of the start of his presidency. So, unlike other murdered Presidents (Lincoln, McKinley, Kennedy) there was hardly any accomplishments to remember him by. You likely do not know anything about him. But that is fine, because the audience’s lack of familiarity with the subject matter only lends to the dramatic unfolding of the narrative. The less you know about a historical event, the less spoilers are involved.

There are two main storylines. The first is Garfield’s (played here by Michael Shannon) unlikely nomination as the Republican candidate in 1880. We are introduced to the party’s main players that form the supporting cast. Roscoe Conkling (played by Shea Whigham) and Chester A. Arthur (played by Nick Offerman) represents the influential and well-funded New York faction. James A. Blaine (played by Bradley Whitford) represents the less influential and less well-funded New England faction. Then there is the second storyline which only has one character, the would be assassin Charles Guiteau (played by Matthew McFayden) who is a delusional nobody who has the tendency to show up uninvited in scenes from the first storyline.

As coincidence would have it (and it is a coincidence because Guiteau is a crazy person), Guiteau’s motivations line up with and seemingly comment on the main controversies of this historical era. The Gilded Age (say post-Civil War and before World War I) is a time of weak federal government, mass industrialization, and the formation of unfettered big business. One thing the TV series could have explained better is why the New York faction has the power that it wields. It is mentioned that three quarters of the economic trade of the country goes through the port of New York City, but what is not mentioned is how exactly that results in most of the federal revenue coming from New York City. The reason is because the federal revenue at the time was based not on income taxes but on tariffs upon international goods. I’m not sure why, but the word tariff isn’t even mentioned.

This situation along with traditional wheeling and dealing amongst politicians induced much bribery for the sale of federal offices and federal land out west. Guiteau believes he is entitled to his fair share of corruption. He is a pathological liar and suffers from delusions of grandeur. McFayden is miscast simply because of his good looks, but apart from that, he does a very good job of portraying a person that at first glance may seem sane enough, but upon further reflection is straight up crazy. It’s all in the eyes.

Normally, I would bristle at the idea of giving a real-life assassin such a prominent role in a story, and I especially liked Tarantino’s “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood” for its example of not taking that route. But here it works, because, well, the character of Guiteau, all nerves and bristle, is a foil to Garfield, who lets face it, is kind of boring. In fact, if the miniseries was mainly Garfield, it would be a boring miniseries. But instead, Garfield is just one character among many men who are either crazy, cynical, or just kind of weak. This has the effect of making Garfield’s presence, when he appears, a pleasant one. Indeed, out of all these flawed men, you would very much want the stoic and serious Garfield to be the President of the United States. When he is picked out of the crowd for an unlikely dark horse nomination at the Chicago convention, you feel, as a citizen, to be tremendously lucky. And when he becomes the victim of a freak assassination, you feel, as a citizen, to be tremendously unlucky. The miniseries makes a strong argument that Garfield could have been a remarkable President.

What is interesting about this story is that its historical constraints inhibit standard character development. Guiteau, because he is crazy, cannot really change as a person. Garfield, because he is assassinated before he can accomplish much, cannot really change either. This leaves a supporting character, Chester A. Arthur, who was nominated as a Vice President because he was part of the New York machine but not the head of it (that would be Roscoe Conkling). Chester A. Arthur is a corrupt soul, beholden to machine politics and grieving the recent death of his wife with more drinking and partying than usual. He is outright disloyal to President Garfield and sees his ascent to the Vice Presidency as a bit of a joke. He is gobsmacked when he is not asked to immediately resign by President Garfield and horrified by the prospect of actually becoming President.

But, and there is historical evidence to this, the good nature of President Garfield apparently induced a moral change in Arthur and when Guiteau kills Garfield under a deluded belief that Arthur, upon ascending the Presidency, would grant him a federal appointment out of gratitude, it deeply affects Arthur. Arthur breaks off his ties with the corrupt New York machine and helps pass civil service reform out of a duty felt to the now deceased President Garfield. So, in a way, Chester A. Arthur is the main character of this miniseries because he is the one that changes. Nick Offerman (typecast as a cynical politician) gives one of his best of many performances as a cynical politician. (A sequel anyone?)

Assassinations are senseless and it is sometimes foolhardy to insist that we can learn anything from them. The motivations of the perpetrators are almost so depressingly irrelevant. Still, “Death by Lightning” perhaps succeeds more than usual, even if in a contrived but forgivable fashion. As Guiteau is awaiting his execution, he is visited by the widow of Garfield, Crete Garfield (played by Betty Gilpin), who gives a great if kind of unbelievable speech about how nobody will remember the assassin because she has exercised her influence to exact her own form of revenge, buying up the manuscript of his autobiography for the purpose of burying it. And we in the audience are also given one last moment of comfort during the execution of Guiteau via McFayden’s performance. The historical reality of Guiteau is that he wouldn’t have come to any late realization of his errors, and the miniseries mainly hews to this reality, except for that one last moment, when we see it in his eyes and we hear it in his last word, “oh”.

This is contrived, but then again, when someone does something terrible because they want to be remembered, sometimes the best revenge, if it is impossible to not forget them completely, is to remember them in the exact opposite way they intended. “Death by Lightning” is a great mini-series and the best anything to be made about our interrupted leader, James A. Garfield,

This miniseries was created/written by Mike Makowsky and directed by Matt Ross, who is best known for playing tech mogul Gavin Belson in the HBO TV series “Silicon Valley.”

A House of Dynamite (4/5 Stars)

This tense thriller takes place in less than twenty minutes and is told three times, from different viewpoints.

In the first act, the action takes place in the White House Situation room, Captain Olivia Walker (played by Rebecca Ferguson) presiding, and an army base in Alaska, Major Daniel Gonzalez (played by Anthony Ramos), presiding. A missile launch somewhere in the Far East is picked up by a satellite. Within a few minutes it is ascertained that the missile has gone suborbital and is heading toward the United States. Within a few more minutes, it is ascertained that the missile is going to hit Chicago. The operators in the first act are the first and only line of defense in what appears to be a preemptive nuclear strike. Although they have trained for their task many times, they fail to stop the missile.

In the second act, the action takes place mainly in STRATCOM, General Anthony Brady (played by Tracy Letts) presiding, and the White House’s Deputy National Security Advisor Jake Bearington’s (played by Gabriel Basso) breathless race to get to work on time and engage foreign leaders to find out what is happening abroad. STRATCOM is located in the Rocky Mountains and commands the nuclear arsenal of the United States. General Anthony Brady acts like he has been preparing for this moment for his entire life. Jake Baerington scrambles around to consult an expert on the North Koreans and the diplomat from Russia, but ultimately cannot provide the President with advice that is conclusive.

In the third act, the action follows the President of the United States (played by Idris Elba) and his belated interactions with Lieutenant Commander Robert Reeves (played by Jonah Hauer-King), the man in charge of the “football”, that briefcase which contains the nuclear codes and follows the President around everywhere he goes just for this kind of scenario. The President’s schedule has him attending a fundraiser with a WNBA star for girls’ sports. Then he is whisked away to make a decision as to whether to commit to an all-out nuclear counterstrike on the USA’s enemies. Each act ends with the President about to decide what to do.

This movie is directed by Kathryn Bigelow, a very capable director who excels at relatively realistic war movies (2008’s The Hurt Locker, 2012’s Zero Dark Thirty) and who, inexplicably, hasn’t made a movie since 2017. Somehow, she hasn’t lost her step. “A House of Dynamite” is a taut thriller that moves along briskly, introduces mainly characters and locations, and explains various procedures. Still, it keeps a clear focus and is, more or less, understandable. Above all, it is an interesting (and maybe plausible) take on a somewhat realistic scenario, which more than anything else, impresses upon the viewer not just the outward stakes in terms of human lives at issue but also the lack of time involved in the decisions that need to be made. Apparently, it would take an intercontinental nuclear strike only twenty minutes to get from somewhere near North Korea to Chicago. And apparently, the United States is so ready and prepared for that scenario, that it could initiate a world-wide counterstrike of apocalyptic proportions on all of our enemies at the same time before the first missile actually landed.

That is kind of amazing when you think about it. I vaguely knew that a man with the Football briefcase followed the President around everywhere just for that eventuality, but I never saw a movie in which that guy opens the briefcase, pulls out the armageddon menu, and ask the President whether he wants to initiate the “rare”, “medium”, or “well-done” plan. This is the type of movie where the subject matter elevates the material. The details in the plot are inherently dramatic. And the more the movie understates its delivery, the more it makes the movie feel real, which underlines that you are seeing a relatively realistic end-of-the-world scenario.

The point of this movie is to impress upon the viewer the importance of nuclear arms proliferation and an urgency for world leaders to once again enter treaties limiting their arsenals. As of next year, I believe there won’t be any of those treaties left. I believe another point the movie is trying to make is that this particular decision is in the hands of one man, the President, who may not be as prepared for this sort of thing as we may all like. In this movie, Idris Elba remarks that he received “one briefing” on this subject. This contrasts with the thousands of rehearsals that the Alaska army base and STRATCOM mention that they have had. Why is the least prepared character person in this movie in charge of the most important decision?

Counterintuitively, I think the people who should really be frightened after seeing this movie are all our would-be nuclear enemies. Although the Americans are shown to be realistically emotional about the situation, they are very competent and have plans in place to deal with it, not only in their attempts to thwart the strike before it happens, but also how to deal with the aftermath locally, and how to seek revenge immediately and on an apocalyptic scale. Consider this movie from the viewpoint of our enemies: one rogue missile is launched and before that missile even touches down 20 minutes later, it shows the American President in the process of confirming launch codes for an immediate and massive counterstrike. Meanwhile, a general impending nuclear armageddon playbook is automatically being implemented with all the functions of government being presently and immediately shuttled to a secure underground bunker in Raven Rock, Pennsylvania.

People are focused on the “House of Dynamite” quote. I think the better quote is the one preceding it, in which the President posits: “I always thought having you follow me around with that book of plans for weapons like that, just being ready is the point, right? Keeps people in check. Keeps the world straight. If they see how prepared we are, no one starts a nuclear war, right?” Hopefully, our enemies see this movie and are reminded of what the United States is capable of.

Current geopolitics affects the screenplay of this movie and also the plausibility of the United States response to the threat. Perhaps because it would be too provocative to actually name the source of the ICBM, the movie provides an excuse for the characters to not know. So there are three possibilities: North Korea, Russia, or China. Out of those three, Russia is the least likely and that is the only country the United States is able to get on the phone to talk about the threat. Not surprisingly, the Russians don’t know or won’t admit to anything. But really, if this was either Russia or China, there wouldn’t only be one missile, there would be at least fifty. It doesn’t really make sense for Russia or China to send over one nuke to wipe out Chicago just to test how the United States would react.

But really, regardless of who has lobbed this missile (and especially if it was North Korea), it doesn’t make sense to present the President with the options that he is presented with. All three options “rare”, “medium” and “well done” are for scenarios in which many nuclear warheads are moving our way, not just one, and certainly not just one from an isolated pariah state. If it is just one, then the most obvious response would be to lob one-and-only-one missile back at a similar target. Tit-for-tat. This shows that the United States will respond, but not in such a way that will necessarily provoke everyone else in shooting off all of their missiles at the same time. It might provoke that response, but not necessarily. If you ever watched “Dr. Strangelove”, you will notice a similar dynamic to “House of Dynamite”. In that movie, a rogue American military officer goes on the loose with the effect of only one nuclear missile being dropped on Russia. The obvious Russian “Tit-for-Tat” response is neutered by its new technology, the “Doomsday Device” which automatically triggers an all out nuclear response regardless of how many missiles have been sent first. Both of these movies present a worst case scenario by involving plot points that prevent the obvious game theory strategy from being implemented. I’m fairly certain our generals at STRATCOM have a basic understanding of game theory.

Finally, this decision is probably best in the hands of the President. The alternative would be to put it in the hands of Congress, which will not have the ability to act with deterrent speed, or the generals, who, let’s face it, have been training their whole lives for this moment. You want Idris Elba, who would rather be at a WNBA fundraiser, making this call, not Tracy Letts, who is unelected and sees every problem as a nail to hit with his nuclear hammer. At the end of the day, the President is a people person and cares about his legacy. He is the one going to try to avoid a nuclear war.