#DARKEST HOUR BUTTON SHORTCUTS MOVIE#
But if Churchill is an island, he is also a rousing populist hero, as demonstrated by an entirely fabricated sequence that gives the movie its schmaltziest moments. When Churchill rides a lift down into the bunker, the film boxes him in on all sides by impenetrable walls of blackness, literalizing the title and making clear, as if we needed reminding, just how isolated this man is. Wright sends the camera soaring around and around the crowded House of Commons, cranking up the spectacle a hundred fold. The cinematographer, Bruno Delbonnel, emphasizes the doomsday mood by giving nearly every actor a ghostly pallor. In "Darkest Hour," that sense of showmanship plays out a visually arresting but sometimes garishly over-the-top effect. OLDMAN: (As Winston Churchill) When will the lesson be learned? When will the lesson be learned? How many more dictators must be wooed, appeased - good God, given immense privileges - before we learn? You cannot reason with a tiger when your head is in its mouth.ĬHANG: As he demonstrated in films like "Pride And Prejudice," "Atonement" and "Anna Karenina," director Joe Wright likes to infuse toney literary material with a daring element of the theatrical. Hitler will not insist on outrageous terms. And before our forces are wiped out completely, now is the time to negotiate in order to obtain the best conditions possible. Europe is still.ĭILLANE: (As Viscount Halifax) Europe has lost. GARY OLDMAN: (As Winston Churchill) Losing. Nothing inglorious in trying to shorten a war that we are clearly losing.
Nothing even remotely patriotic in death or glory, if the odds are firmly on the former. STEPHEN DILLANE: (As Viscount Halifax) There's nothing heroic in going down fighting if it can be avoided. But the prime minister, determined to seek victory at all costs, isn't having any of it. Among Churchill's rivals turned advisers is Viscount Halifax, a Chamberlain ally played by Stephen Dillane who's bent on negotiating a peaceful surrender with Germany. Much of the movie takes place not at 10 Downing Street but in the cabinet war rooms, an underground bunker where Churchill pours over military maps, spars with his cabinet and consults his young typist Elizabeth, an audience stand-in nicely played by Lily James. If you've seen Christopher Nolan's harrowing epic "Dunkirk," which focused on the logistics of that famous evacuation, "Darkest Hour" provides an undeniably fascinating look behind the scenes. He'd better be anyway, with Britain's armed forces about to be wiped out by the Germans on the northern coast of France. Kristin Scott Thomas puts a commanding spin on Winston's faithful, fiercely intelligent wife Clementine, who turns up every so often to remind him why he's the right man for the job. Churchill has a private audience with King George VI, who, as played by a terrifically restrained Ben Mendelsohn, is very good at hiding his reservations about the appointment.
Although widely distrusted by the political establishment for his irascible, unpredictable streak, Churchill is rightly seen as the only one strong enough to unite all parties and lead Britain to victory.Įven with the apocalypse looming, there's a bit of official pomp and tradition to get through. Neville Chamberlain, having gotten nowhere with his disastrous appeasement policy, has resigned as prime minister, leaving Churchill the unlikely beneficiary. Western Europe is crumbling under Hitler's onslaught.
#DARKEST HOUR BUTTON SHORTCUTS SERIES#
John Lithgow won an Emmy for his turn as an aging postwar Churchill in the hit Netflix series "The Crown." Now comes "Darkest Hour," a ham-fisted prestige entertainment but a grand showpiece for Gary Oldman, who gives us perhaps the biggest, brashest and certainly most prosthetic-heavy screen version of Churchill yet.ĭirected by Joe Wright from a hypereloquent script by Anthony McCarten, "Darkest Hour" unfolds over several tense weeks in May 1940. In the recent film "Churchill," Brian Cox played the prime minister as he confronted the looming specter of D-Day. JUSTIN CHANG, BYLINE: Winston Churchill is having something of a renaissance moment in popular entertainment. Hitler's forces are rampaging across Western Europe when Churchill is appointed prime minister of England in 1940. The film is set during the early days of World War II. Film critic Justin Chang has a review of "Darkest Hour," starring Gary Oldman as Winston Churchill.
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