Darkest Hour (2017) ★★★★☆

Humpo Show Rating | 8.5

IMDb Rating | 7.4

Starring: Gary Oldman, Lily James, Kristin Scott Thomas, Ben Mendelsohn, Ronald Pickup, Stephen Dillane

Director: Joe Wright

Plot Summary: During the early days of World War II, the fate of Western Europe hangs on the newly-appointed British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, who must decide whether to negotiate with Hitler, or fight on against incredible odds. (IMDb)

Darkest Hour is a compelling film about the first month (May 1940) of Churchill’s tenure as Prime Minister, when Western Europe was on its knees with the German Army wiping out everything in its path. Neville Chamberlain is being ushered out, and Churchill is reluctantly called for to take Chamberlain’s place. The British Army is stranded at Dunkirk and Calais, his Party are eagerly proposing peace talks as the answer, and the British people know little of the worst news concerning the Army. With the weight of the world on his shoulders, Churchill must make a decision that would change history forever.

There has been much made of Gary Oldman’s performance, he has recently won a Golden Globe for Best Actor, he is also a shoe-in for the BAFTA, and he is also quite likely to scoop up an Oscar to complete the Best Actor Treble. The acclaim comes as no surprise after watching his superlative performance as one of the most famous Britons ever. He delivers speeches with passion, his conversations with his wife Clementine (Scott Thomas) with fragility, and his deliberations with his typist (James) with profound thought. Oldman manages to become Churchill, and not just a caricature of the man that is often the case.

One story that has emerged recently, concerns the realistic transformation Oldman undertook for his role as Churchill, relates to the first initial read-through of the script by the cast of Darkest Hour. They had gathered in the standard dress-down code of jeans and T-shirts, ready and waiting to begin running through the script in a relaxed but professional atmosphere. Then the door opened – and in walked Winston Churchill. Gary Oldman had donned the full prosthetics, three-piece suit and was brandishing a cigar. As he walked, slowly and slightly stooped, to his place at the head of the table, everyone stood up, as if to attention.

‘It was spine-tingling,’ recalls screenwriter Anthony McCarten, the Oscar-nominated writer of The Theory Of Everything. ‘And from that moment I never really saw Gary Oldman at all. For the next three months while we were shooting, I worked with Winston Churchill.’¹

McCarten was not the only person to be mesmerised by Oldman’s nuanced rendition. It has been hailed by members of the Churchill family as the finest-ever screen characterisation of their formidable ancestor. Churchill’s granddaughter, Emma Soames, insists no one has ever before captured the complexity of the man with such adroitness. ‘I watch so many portrayals of him with dread,’ she says. ‘But Oldman was quite magnificent. It was like watching a familiar Shakespeare soliloquy. You knew the words, but this was the actor who brought a whole new meaning to them.’

It is not at the same level as the film Dunkirk was last year in terms of spectacle and cinematography, but it actually acts as quite a good prequel to it, given that the film centres on the appointment of Churchill as Prime Minister and the decision he has to make on whether to negotiate peace talks with Hitler, or to attempt a daring rescue of the British troops stranded at Dunkirk. There is infinitely more dialogue in the Darkest Hour, which reflects the mastery of the English language that Churchill possessed, his speeches, deliberations and conversations were brimming with proficiency and inspiration. Halifax’s line near the end of the film highlights what an excellent wordsmith Churchill was “He has declared war by mobilising the English language.”

¹ Mail Online, 30 December 2017