Bombshell: The Hedy Lamarr Story

4/25/18. This is a really well done biopic about an underrated actress who got her just due with this film. I really liked her in Samson and Delilah although I haven't seen any of her other movies. Over the years I have heard her mentioned as an inventor and thought that was a curious fact to share about an actress. This biopic goes into enough detail for the viewer to understand just how intelligent Lamarr was in electronics and that her inventions are still being used in our time through the technology we use. Sadly, she was never compensated for her patents. If she was she wouldn't have lived such a hardscrabble life in her later years and had all that plastic surgery that really ruined her face. It is somewhat sad to see how such a talented woman had a series of unhappy marriages that emotionally ruined her and how Hollywood never gave her the recognition she wanted and so truly deserved. Worth catching.

Many film lovers ONLY know Hedy Lamarr the actress whose face lite up the silver screen. Few knew of her contribution to our digital/wireless/blue-tooth enabled world through her inventive mind. Bombshell is that very story wrapped around her cinematic career. The director delivers a wonderful documentary of the great Hedy Lamarr.

For some reason I thought it was going to be a bio epic.  I wondered who they would get to play Ms. Lamar.  Using archival footage, stills and a recording of an interview with the star they got Hedy Lamar to play Hedy Lamar.  It was a moving touching history of a woman who had many accomplishments.

She helped Howard Hughes design better planes by studying streamlining in birds and fishes.  She invented Frequency Hopping (along with composer George Antheil).  She founded Aspen as a ski resort.  She produced movies (unheard of for a woman at the time).  She came up with techniques on cosmetic surgery to hide the scars.  Unfortunately she also became a poster child for reasons not to undergo the operation.  Her unsuccessful surgeries probably added to her being a recluse.

She wanted to be recognized for her mind and not her beauty.  Yet she married a series of men who treated her as a trophy wife.  Her most famous contribution to science was in devising a system for secret transmissions (frequency hopping).  It's greater value was not realized until the advent of GPS, Bluetooth and WiFi.

She was recognized/honoured for her invention at a Science Forum which she opted not to attend but left a recording played by her son.  The film showed her phoning halfway through the presentation to ask how it went.  Her son advises that he is in the middle of it and that he loves her.

Frequency hopping has multiple inventors. In 1899 Marconi performed an experiment using the technique.  Nikola Tesla received a patent in 1903.  German military used frequency hopping in World War One.  A Polish inventor, Leonard Danilewicz had the idea in 1929.  In 1942 a patent was awarded to Hedy Lamar.  In 1980 a Winnipeg filmmaker originated the idea (called Variable Transmission Broadcast) as a plot device to represent Norway in a symbolic re-enactment of World War Two where rival transportation companies, representing Germany and England, sought to steal the idea symbolic of invading Norway (both sides wanted to).  The film did not get made but it is ironic that frequency hopping technology of Bluetooth has Scandanavian roots.  Ray Zinn gained a patent in 2006 for his version.  Slight improvements justify issuing new patents.

Although she had raised $25 million for the War effort her patent was confiscated based on her being a foreign alien (having been born in Austria).

The navy had secretly used her technology some ten years later.  She would have been entitled to royalty payments if she had known.  She also didn't know that you can only go back six years from the time one launches a lawsuit.  It is not enough to have a patent; one has to Police it to see if being infringed; Prosecute (take it to court); Prove it was your idea they stole; and Profit* for the effort By the time she found out her patent had long expired.

The film covers her being exploited as a movie star and inventor and innovator.  This late tribute values her contributions and recognizes her pioneering roles.

* back then you could recover costs - today that provision has been taken away.  So it is profitable to steal patents and only pay royalties once losing in court (happens may be one time in eight that an inventor sues).  See "Flash of Genius".

No trick photography, no special gimmicks. Nothing out of the ordinary is needed when the life story we're presented with is so unique. The Hedy Lamarr story is way more than a biography of an old timer who used to be a Hollywood star. It's more than the story of "the most beautiful woman in the world" whose talents well exceeded her beauty.

It's a story of our failings as a society when faced with whatever defied the conventions we live by. And the tragedy of those that wouldn't fit under the labels we like to stick on whoever crosses our path. To put it in a single sentence it's a story most of us know nothing about but all of us should. If you do get the chance just go see it.

I mentioned that the documentary was even-handed because all too often, I've seen biographies of various celebrities which either only focus on the bad or only the good about folks. Folks have positive and negative qualities...and Hedy Lamarr is no exception.

The film is a biography of the actress that also focuses on her inventing the concept of rotating frequencies...enabling a sub, for example, to launch a radio-guided torpedo without worries about the enemy jamming the signal. It's a strange invention for an actress to have made...and the film helps to show that Lamarr was not just a pretty face. It also, sadly, talks about her personal life...which was filled with husband and husband and disappointment after disappointment. And, it talks about Lamarr's drug use (created by the studio) and her odd personality quirks. All put together, it makes for an intriguing look at a fascinating lady. Well worth seeing...and a nice film about a feminist in 1930s-40s Hollywood.