Le Kid atomique

What better way to start a movie and grab your audience's attention than with a nuclear blast? THE ATOMIC KID does just that, arriving in movie theatres and drive-ins at the height of cold war fever and Joe McCarthy looking for communists everywhere. How many card carrying members' names did 'Tail-gunner Joe' have inside that well worn briefcase? Anyway, Mickey Rooney stars as Blix Waterberry, the man who survives an atomic explosion at Ground Zero, located in a remote area of Nevada. Above ground testing of atomic and hydrogen bombs were standard operating procedure during the 1950's as long as the detonations were far removed from any populated areas. Still, the sight of military personnel gazing at the blast wearing 'protective' eye goggles in a fully exposed trench just a few miles away is quite hard to forget. A full fifteen seconds after the mushroom cloud ominously rises, the "All Clear" is sounded and the soldiers move briskly toward the bomb site.

Mickey Rooney as 'Blix' emerges as the human remnant of the test house designed to prove what would happen to a prefab structure against a nuclear explosion. Blix is really none the worse for wear, a bit singed from head to foot and wisps of smoke swirling from his hair. The only immediate side effect is a speech abnormality causing him to speak like audio tape on fast forward. Thankfully, this is temporary. He is also holding on to a peanut butter sandwich which is still intact, just a bit on the toasted side.

The plot then gravitates to 'Blix' undergoing a battery of tests by the military and scientists. The love interest is filled by comely Elaine Davis (then wife #4 to Mickey Rooney) who portrays a nurse at the hospital where 'Blix' is being held for observation. Miss Davis' (aka Elaine Devry) most memorable on screen moments occur with a series of appealing smirks directed at Blix. She does light up the screen when it's lights down low for some pitch and woo in the parlor with THE ATOMIC KID. Or maybe it's because Blix becomes phosphorescent, as he's all hot and bothered after a smooch from his after hours nurse. Miss Davis would parlay those sexy smirks as well as her hour-glass figure into a lucrative motion picture and television career.

Robert Strauss is ideal as 'Stan Cooper', burly best friend to Blix and always with an eye to get rich quick. This is where cold war spy antics become involved as an unnamed foreign country (presumably the Soviet Union) tries to get to Blix through Stan offering him instant wealth for instant pictures of THE ATOMIC KID. Strauss is hilarious as the unknowing dupe to Peter Brocco, the spy in the gray flannel suit.

The Saturday matinée atmosphere gives itself away throughout this flick. One can easily imagine this as a perfect vehicle for Abbott & Costello or, perhaps, Martin & Lewis. Jerry could easily play it over the top as the radio-active kid and Dino would play it straight when not crooning his velvet voice toward Elaine Davis.

With a competent supporting cast including Hal March as an FBI agent and Whit Bissell as Dr. Edgar Panghorn, THE ATOMIC KID is the brainchild of none other than Blake Edwards. Directed by Leslie H. Martinson in his first foray behind the camera, (he would later helm vehicles as diverse as P.T. 109 and BATMAN with Adam West) THE ATOMIC KID is worth a peak just before you 'Duck and Cover.'

I remember this film from when it was new--if this is the same film. Today I was trying to remember the star, and that's how I ran across this comment.

Does anyone know if there were any other films like it? A comedy with a rube who accidentally finds himself in a house that is at the center of an atomic bomb test? If not, this is it. It made a lasting impression on an 11-year-old who had practiced ducking under the desk. It seems like in the film they surmised that the reason he was able to survive the bomb had something to do with what he was eating at the time. Which, I guess from reading the synopsis, was a peanut butter sandwich. Must have been a huge promotion for Peter Pan!

Robert Strauss was a remarkably memorable character actor. Although he looked physically threatening, he actually played comic roles more frequently than villains (and if he played a convict or a hood, it was usually for comic affect). His great breakout part was in STALAG 17, when he was the Betty Grable loving P.O.W. "Animal", who had a memorable (and ultimately sad) moment dancing while drunk with Harvey Lembeck in a "blond wig". But after STALAG 17 there was no comparable role to build on. His next film with Billy Wilder would be as the lecherous building superintendent in THE SEVEN YEAR ITCH. But it was ultimately easy and hard to cast him. Easy in supporting bit parts, but hard to find roles he really deserved.

I consider THE ATOMIC KID the nearest Strauss got to a true leading part. It was made one year after STALAG 17, so his name recognition was still high. And he was teamed with another sure fire box office draw (though slightly faded in 1954), Mickey Rooney. Rooney as a leading draw peaked in the 1940s in his series with Lewis Stone about the Hardy Family. But he was always a capable and entertaining performer, and he and Strauss work well together as a team.

THE ATOMIC KID could easily have been an Abbott and Costello property. The two leads are looking for uranium in the desert, and they have car problems. They find a deserted house, and Rooney stays in it while Strauss goes trying to get help for their car. Rooney finds the larder of the house well stocked with provisions, and makes himself a peanut butter sandwich or two while he waits. Then hell breaks loose - the house is a faked house (though if faked why does it have furniture and food in it) and is at ground zero for an atomic blast site. It is hit, but Rooney survives.

He becomes a national sensation - the first known human being to survive an atomic blast at it's metric center, untouched. Why? Was it the diet of peanut butter sandwiches? One can see Lou Costello in such a role (although he might have insisted the sandwich be a pastrami sandwich), and Strauss replaced by Abbott. Like Bud, Robert always sees the big picture - the money to be made in marketing the celebrity of his friend the survivor. And he soon has all sorts of contracts being signed by Mickey (as Bud would have had Lou sign them) for endorsements - like peanut butter brands. Between this and the constant testing by the government, Rooney has time for little else - although he soon is romancing his nurse, Elaine Davis. However, soon the FBI (Hal March) is aware of another interested party: the Russians have sent an agent to try to discover Rooney's immunity secret.

As a shot at the marketing of modern celebrity in America (think now of Paris Hilton, Marilu Rettin, or George Foreman), THE ATOMIC KID is on target as much as it's contemporary Judy Holiday film, IT SHOULD HAPPEN TO YOU. As a piece of amusing whimsy, it does proud for both Rooney and Strauss (who, despite his crass greed, does show his loyal friendship to Rooney when the latter is endangered). But it is the business of cold war paranoia in the film's background that is fascinating.

I reviewed, some time ago, a contemporary English comedy called YOU KNOW WHAT SAILORS ARE. It too dealt with the fear of nuclear annihilation in the 1950s, and how the public wished it away. There it was "demolished" when Akim Tamiroff and a friendly scientist concocted a scheme to convince the Russians that a make-shift gizmo (that really did not do anything) could demolish nuclear missiles upon take off. Here it is the survival of Rooney, apparently by eating peanut butter. Peanut butter would not be served as well again as a diet treat or power source until Jim Henson's Muppet, "the Great Mumford" would invent his magic catch phrase "a la peanut butter sandwiches" on Sesame Street. Would that something as tasty and satisfying as peanut butter could protect us all from nuclear destruction. It probably could not. Even, in the end, the scientists studying Rooney are not able to say why he survived.

'Blix' Waterberry (Mickey Rooney) and Stan Cooper (Robert Strauss), a couple of uranium prospectors lost in the Nevada desert, wander into an experimental house at ground zero of an atom bomb test. Despite hiding in the closet, Blix is exposed to the full force of the nuclear blast but miraculously survives, emerging radioactive and manifesting odd abilities. Made in the early years of the cold war, this was one of the first 'atomic comedies' and a typical example of a Hollywood 'radiation can do anything' plot-line. Blix is 'hot' enough to glow in the dark and fog film but even the scientists don't seem worried that he might sterilise (or induce cancer in) anyone he stands near. The 'living chain-reaction' wears a Geiger-counter wrist-watch that clicks when his 'neutrons' become temporarily exited (by kissing a pretty girl for example), his proximity causes slot-machines to 'jackpot', and his arms function as radio antenna. All of this nonsense is played strictly for laughs in Blake Edward's simplistic screenplay but even to contemporary audiences the premise must have seemed a bit ridiculous ("...far-fetched and forced" according to Variety's Dec 8, 1954 review). Rooney mugs it up in a typical 'lovable sucker' role, rough-voiced Strauss is fine as his conniving buddy/manager and Elaine Devry (one of serial-groom Rooney's many brides) is pretty as Blix's nurse-love-interest Audrey (another cookie-cutter role). The first half of the film, up until Blix 'escapes' from the hospital, is moderately amusing but the casino scenes with Audrey are just silly and there is a tacked-on 'espionage' sub-plot so Strauss has something to do when producer Rooney is not on screen. Clearly writer Edwards ran out of ideas as the down-hill slide of the story ends abruptly and inexplicably, setting up one last predictable gag. Silly but topical at the time of release, now just silly.

This is an enjoyable little programmer from the early 1950s. Mickey Rooney (the #1 box office draw in the late 1930s and early 1940s) was no longer an A list star, and was hardly a "kid" at 34. The breezy plot, with it's sci-fi/comedy blend, along with Rooney and Strauss having an abundance of charisma, make this a great waste of time. If you enjoy the Bowery Boys, Francis The Talking Mule (Rooney actually starred in the final 'Francis' film) and The Ma & Pa Kettle series, this should be right up your alley! Rooney and Strauss have a great chemistry, and they clearly could have thrived as a defacto comedy team in a few more pictures. You may have a hard time locating this film, but for a few dollars, it's well worth it!