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Johnson Thomas
It’s the spring of 1940 and Western Europe has already been ravaged by Hitler’s marauding onslaught. Winston Churchill (Gary Oldman), the newly appointed British Prime Minister has the onerous task of deciding whether to cave in or fight to the finish.
The British public is looking to him to save their pride. Christopher Nolan’s ‘Dunkirk’ showed us how heavy and hard that price was while Joe Wright’s ‘Darkest Hours’ shows us what it took to make those decisions in the four weeks that changed the course of world history, forever.
Churchill was no saint and Andrew McCarten scripts his character; balancing the good with the bad. The stain of Gallipoli is, however, overshadowed by the stellar aftermath of Churchill’s cold call to fight against all odds. His navigation of his war cabinet makes it a drama that is both highly intense and intellectually stimulating.
Churchill had popular backing during wartime, but as soon as the war ended his reign ended too. But that’s not the subject of discussion here. The dramatic wordy verbalism of this drama is even more stimulating than ‘Dunkirk.’ It’s, of course, hindsight that lends us this rosy perspective of a period that is certainly hard to define.
With the German threat looming large and America on the verge of declining to help, the United Kingdom was indeed facing its darkest hours. The context of the German domination pitted against a cornered Britain is almost a David and Goliath story in itself.
McCarter makes sure the war cabinet deliberations have all the pungency and urgency that could shake you. Churchill’s main opponents, Neville Chamberlain (Ronald Pickup) and Lord Halifax (Stephen Dillane) make their points of view matter while King George VI’s (Ben Mendelsohn), eventual capitulation to Churchill’s viewpoint is also quite telling of the latter’s popularity with the people.
While director Joe Wright makes this experience an entirely scintillating one, kudos must be shared with the splendid cast (Gary Oldman in particular), as well as the music composer, editor and cinematographer who together light up this hitherto forgotten piece of history with a luminescence that is all too beguiling. Awards are bound to come its way this season!
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