Bombshell: The Hedy Lamarr Story review – startling life of the film star/inventor

There can hardly be any more extraordinary story from the Hollywood golden age than that of Hedy Lamarr; a very beautiful star with a moderate acting talent but an untutored brilliance in science and engineering that should by now be getting her compared to Nikola Tesla, or maybe even a neglected female scientist like Rosalind Franklin. Her tragedy was that she was in the wrong business, precisely that business that promotes beauty over brains – the movie business.

Alexandra Dean’s excellent and important documentary about her is very instructive – a parable of modern sexual politics and assumptions about science. Even now, many can’t believe in their hearts that movie star Hedy Lamarr really was a scientist, or scientist manqué. The accomplishment simply doesn’t square with the accepted female star biography narrative into which Lamarr otherwise fits: movies, husbands, poignant reclusive decline etc. Many film encyclopedias and reference books simply omit what was important about Hedy Lamarr.

As a Jewish refugee from Hitler’s Austria and already a celebrity on account of her nude appearance as a teenager in the steamy German film Ecstasy, Hedy Kiesler (with her new stage name “Lamarr”) was signed up by Louis B Mayer. It was in the 40s that Lamarr pursued inventing in her spare time after a hard day in the studio. And, without any of the official support and funding that was lavished on a battalion of unproductive dunderheads and with some hobbyist equipment given to her by Howard Hughes, she contributed to a discovery that was to change the course of the 20th century.

Source: theguardian