COMMAND AND CONTROL (Robert Kenner). 92 minutes. Opens Friday (September 23). See listing. Rating: NNNN
Adapted from Eric Schlosser’s book, Robert Kenner’s Command And Control – which starts its commercial run at the Hot Docs Cinema this week after well-received screenings at the festival earlier this spring – examines the threat posed by weapons of mass destruction from an angle rarely discussed: human error and negligence.
Shooting in a decommissioned missile facility for an eerie you-are-there effect, Kenner recreates the September 1980 incident when a dropped 6-pound socket ruptured the fuel tank of a Titan II missile.
For nine hours, the staff worked to stop a nuclear warhead detonation that would have flattened the whole of Arkansas – and that’s not the only time we’ve come unnervingly close to a weapons-related disaster.
As Schlosser and Kenner explain, it’s just dumb luck that some distracted technician hasn’t accidentally triggered one of these things – and if that doesn’t keep you up at night, it damn well should.
