Friday, November 24, 2017

Darkest Hour [2017]

MPAA (PG-13)  CNS/USCCB ()  RogerEbert.com (4 Stars)  AVClub (B-)  Fr. Dennis (3 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB () review
Los Angeles Times () review
RogerEbert.com (G. Cheshire) review
AVClub (I. Vishnevetsky) review


Darkest Hour [2017] (directed by Joe Wright, screenplay by Anthony McCarten) continues a recent fascination in the Anglo-American world with the life of Winston Churchill [wikip] [IMDb] (played in the current film by Gary Oldman), for this is the third film in less than a year about him, the other two being Churchill [2017], Dunkirk [2017] and now the current film, the first about the lead-up to the 1944 Invasion of Normandy which served to decisively win World War II for the Allies, and the second film along with current one about the much darker time (hence the current film's name...) near the beginning of the War when, honestly, ALL could have been lost, IF NOT perhaps for _this man_.

For years, Winston Churchill had been sounding the alarm in Britain and the West about the existential danger to a free humanity that Adolf Hitler and the Nazis posed.  Since Britain and France were desperate to avert another war as murderous as the First World War, Britain's previous Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain [wikip] (played in the current film by Ronald Pickup) hoped they could buy Hitler off through a policy of Appeasement. After washing his hands from a potential conflict between Germany and my parents' country of Czechoslovakia (by giving Hitler everything that he wanted ... at the time...) Chamberlain tried to declare that he had acheived "Peace with Honor" and "Peace in our Time," to which Churchill retorted that as a result of selling the Czechs into essentially slavery Britain will find neither Peace nor Honor, and eighteen months later, when the story of this film began Chamberlain if perhaps both cowardly and not particularly bright admitted that "Churchill was right."

But what now?  In a line that certainly stuck-out for me in this film, Churchill tells his wife Clementine (played wonderfully in the film by Kristen Scott Thomas) that, with the Germans having invaded Holland and Belgium and racing toward France, he was being made Prime Minister _now_ only because "the ship was already sinking."  His hope, as remarkably, always was, to try to still keep it (Britain) afloat.

AND THE TASK WAS DAUNTING.  As was amply presented in this summer's film Dunkirk [2017], THE WHOLE of BRITAIN'S army was soon surrounded near the French port of Dunkirk, And the legendary British Navy notwithstanding, WITHOUT a CREDIBLE ARMY ... there was simply no way the British political class would support continuing the War.

So he had to find a way to get the army out: Having been his whole life associated with the British Navy, Churchill did know a thing or two about its capabilities and its contingency plans, and so he did call on the Navy to requisition all those private boats and pleasure craft to sail out to Dunkirk and bring the vast majority of the British soldiers trapped there home.

But there still was the need to convince the political class to keep fighting.  Many, notably Viscount Halifax (played in the film by Stephen Dillane) wanted to still make a deal with Hitler if it would prevent an invasion.

Perhaps more than even the other two films, this one was about one man trying to convince an entire nation (and especially its leadership) that FIGHTING rather than SURRENDER was still worth it. 

The Viscount Halifax was right.  Almost certainly SOME KIND OF A DEAL could have been made, but MY GOD, WOULD THIS WORLD BE COMPLETELY DIFFERENT (and MUCH, MUCH WORSE FOR IT) if Britain would have folded.

There are times when one really does have to _stand_ and fight even if success is by no means guaranteed.  Excellent film!  But ... why are we seeing SO MANY films about Churchill now?  What are we being warned about?


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1 comment:

  1. Before we laud old Churchill with all this historical glory . Let me sober up a few these Churchill supporters.
    This movie(DARKEST HOUR) fails to tell the truth about Churchill and his lying or his deliberate untruthfulness blaming the Belgian King and the Belgian army for the BEF's defeat in 1940. When in truth it was the Belgian King and the Belgian army that sacrificed themselves to allow the BEF to escape!
    Listen to Lord Keyes as he speaks to the BBC on THE GREAT LIE !
    link below
    https://youtu.be/Py-bZ3XMHcI
    How DARKEST HOUR or Dunkirk were made omitting this vital germain event in May 1940 reveals Churchills dirty work that know one wants to talk about.

    Churchill suprested the truth, these lies are now coming out as classified damning documents are now being made public.
    See Whose Fault Was Dunkirk?
    link below
    https://longreads.com/2017/08/07/whose-fault-was-dunkirk/

    It took over 40 years to get the old Churchill Society to come clean, because I finally had the evedence on them and they had no where to hide but admit Churchill had lied
    they used the words gross “terminological in exactitude” in describing Churchills actions.
    Copy and paste link below
    https://www.winstonchurchill.org/.../feeding-the.../

    In his book Dunkirk History behind the Motion Picture Joshua Levine used my research to clearly point out Churchill's Great Lie.
    link below
    https://www.amazon.com/Dunkirk-History.../dp/006274030X

    Perhaps now we can say, KIng Leopold III King of The Belgians,Commander and Chief of the Belgian Army May 10 1940 -May 28 1940 vindicated as
    "The Scapegoat who saved the British from defeat in 1940"

    ReplyDelete