The Darkest Hour is just before the first Scotch of the morning
England only had to deal with their “darkest hour” for 5 years...we had 8! And they were actually able to shoot back and fight whereas we had to just sit down and suck it up.
Churchill: "And you, madam, are ugly. But in the morning, I shall be sober."
Winston Churchill
Just saw this yesterday morning.
I thought it was well done. In many, many ways it made me think of what President Trump faces on a daily basis.
Best scene was when Churchill jumped out of his car and road the underground for one stop. If that scene is true, those people were heroic and epic in their own time.
“Never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never-in nothing, great or small, large or petty - never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.”
Poster hangs in my law office.
I’ve always enjoyed Gary Oldman’s craft. I am not a regular movie-goer at all (it’s been over 20 years since I darkened the door of any movie theatre), but this one is on my “must see” list, both for the acting and the partial story of one of the 20th century’s greatest leaders.
I saw this over the weekend. Much better in my opinion than Dunkirk. Dunkirk was all action, Churchill was the central figure of the story of Dunkirk yet was barely mentioned. This movie was all about Churchill. There was no action at all really. But it told the real story in my opinion.
The scene toward the end with Winnie on the tube was brilliant !
Their latter day foibles notwithstanding, that statement nails it precisely.
Chartwell books in NYC has an interesting website all about Churchill.
wow great review. makes me want to go see it. loved the line at the end,
“Unlike Iron-Man 5 and Spider-Man 12 and Cardboard-Man 19 and Franchise-Man 37, this is the film of an actual, real-life superhero....”
so true.
There was a little poetic license in it.
I found the most difficult scenes were in his own home where he came across as feeble. Something tells me that wasn't the case in real life.
Winnie was half American and was proud of it.
“...the lighting is crepuscular”
Oh for more film reviews with this level of literacy!
“As with Christopher Nolan’s Dunkirk, one’s admiration for the film is tempered by a terrible profound sadness - for a people who “won the war, and lost their country anyway”: the “long island story” is ending, and without anyone feeling the need to lie choking on the ground over it. To anyone old enough to remember an England where one could “walk into any pub in the country and ask with perfect confidence if the major had been in”, that sense of loss can bring tears to the eye. Unlike Iron-Man 5 and Spider-Man 12 and Cardboard-Man 19 and Franchise-Man 37, this is the film of an actual, real-life superhero: You leave the theater with the cheers of the House ringing in your ears ...and return to a world where quoting Churchill in his own land can get you arrested.”
Mark is such a wonderful read.
I will admit that this one had me laughing out loud.
A good movie but highly fictionalized in many respects.
The film had its flaws, but even so was head and shoulders above most other films of the past five or even ten years. Because of the subject matter: arguably the greatest man of the past century.
We loved the film, though. Gary Oldman was invisible and all I saw was Churchill in his performance. My wife did not know much about the Great Man going in, and she found it fascinating.