'Bridge of Spies': How Steven Spielberg's film is different from other Cold War movies

'Bridge' stars Tom Hanks as James Donovan, a lawyer who becomes involved in the Cold War. The film is the newest movie by Spielberg to depict a period in world history.

|
Jaap Buitendijk/Disney/AP
'Bridge of Spies' stars Tom Hanks (r.) and Mark Rylance (l.).

Steven Spielberg’s newest film, “Bridge of Spies,” opens on Oct. 16.

“Bridge” centers on James Donovan (Tom Hanks), a lawyer who becomes involved in a prisoner exchange with Rudolf Abel, a spy for the Soviet Union, being exchanged for American pilot Francis Gary Powers.

The film is the newest historical work for Spielberg. He also directed the 2012 film “Lincoln,” 2005’s “Munich,” and the World War II stories “Saving Private Ryan” and “Schindler’s List,” among others. 

“Bridge” takes place during the Cold War and its true story shows how at one point the fears of the paranoid era came true: there really was a spy for the Soviet Union living in America. The story is more inspiring than anything, however. Spielberg focuses on the fact that Donovan was an everyday person who chose to do what was right in defending Abel in court, and the role has critics comparing Hanks to actor James Stewart, who stars in such inspiring movies as “It’s a Wonderful Life” and “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.”

This depiction is different from some famously dark Cold War movies, many of which were made as the political situation was still going on. A classic of the genre is the 1964 movie “Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb.” Stanley Kubrick’s film is a dark look at war and politics, with lines like “War is too important to be left to politicians” and the film ending with various nuclear bombs going off. 

Films based off works by writer John le Carré like the 1965 film “The Spy Who Came in from the Cold” (a movie referenced by Spielberg himself as one of his inspirations) and 2011’s “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy” often have characters with ambiguous morals. “Spy” has protagonist Alec Leamas (Richard Burton) unaware for most of the film of what side various people are on and the film does not end well for his optimistic girlfriend Nan (Claire Bloom).

Even a movie starring actors more known for such films as “Dirty Dancing” and “Back to the Future” has a dark plot. The 1984 movie “Red Dawn,” starring Patrick Swayze, Lea Thompson, Jennifer Grey, and Charlie Sheen, centered on teenagers whose town is taken over by Communist forces. Some of the characters are killed, though at the end of the movie, it appears that American forces were able to defeat the Communist forces in the country. 

A 1983 movie also starring a young star of that time presented a somewhat pacifist message. The film “WarGames,” starring Matthew Broderick, has a computer conclude in a famous line from the movie that in nuclear war, “the only winning move is not to play.”

Meanwhile, Spielberg’s theme in “Bridge of Spies” of people teaming up to make a difference is echoed in his other films, as with “Lincoln,” in which the president and others work to abolish slavery, and in “Saving Private Ryan,” in which American soldiers search for a fellow military man so he can be sent home. In “Schindler’s List,” the work of Oskar Schindler and Itzhak Stern resulted in many lives being saved during the Holocaust.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to 'Bridge of Spies': How Steven Spielberg's film is different from other Cold War movies
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/The-Culture/Culture-Cafe/2015/1014/Bridge-of-Spies-How-Steven-Spielberg-s-film-is-different-from-other-Cold-War-movies
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe