Official Secrets

First Hit: I really enjoyed this film not only because of the exceptional acting but also because I learned about this brave individual.

Katharine Gun (Keira Knightley) worked for the British Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) as part of British Intelligence. Her mandarin language translation skills from living all around Asia as a child, helped the agency translate tapped intercepted telephone conversations and write reports about them. Her job was to help prevent terrorist activities and attacks in Britain.

One day she receives an email with an attached memo stating that the United States and Britain were going to coerce votes from small United Nations members to influence the support for invading Iraq. George Bush and his team of people wanted to invade Iraq after 9-11, and he wanted to do it legally with United Nations support. Manufacturing evidence (WMDs) and using this coercion of small nations, they would get UN approval to bomb the hell out of Iraq. Bush wanted to prove that the US was doing something about the 9-11 attack and he felt his father the senior Bush didn’t do enough when they’d previously invaded Iraq.

The attached memo was seen by Gun as collusion between England and the US to enter this war illegally. With a deep sense of purpose to stop this illegal action and from the potential deaths of fellow Englishmen, US soldiers and possibly thousands of Iraqi citizens, she prints a copy of the memo and gives this copy to a friend who will give it to the press. Three weeks go by, and it isn’t published, but finally Martin Bright (Matt Smith) of The Observer decides, after doing their due diligence, to release the memo in full and all hell breaks loose.

Scotland Yard starts their investigation at GCHQ and shortly after the interviews begin, Katharine admits she leaked the memo in violation of the Official Secrets Act. After threatening and harassing her and her husband Yasar (Adam Bakri), even arresting him and attempt to deport him, eight months later the government decides to formally charge Gun.

Obtaining Ben Emerson (Ralph Fiennes) a volunteer lawyer, through a public legal group, they decide to take on the government. By investigating authorized personnel in the government that had initially told Prime Minister Tony Blair that his actions would be illegal, they decided to fight the case. Because it is public knowledge, I’ll share that the government exonerated Gun from the crimes she committed even though she confessed to leaking the document.

This was a great story and one I knew nothing about until seeing this film.

Knightley is fantastic as Gun. Her ability to be fragile, scared, and brave, all at once is perfect for this film. Great casting call. Smith, as Bright was excellent. His drive to publish the article was strong. His look when someone on their staff used “spellcheck” on his story and changed the spelling of key words was perfect. Bakri as Gun’s husband was wonderful. His caring support of Katharine felt genuine. Fiennes was excellent as Gun’s lawyer, and the scene at the end of the film when he asks his friend to leave the spot where he’s fishing is pointed about how things have to change. Rhys Ifans was fabulous as US investigative reporter Ed Vulliamy. His outrageous drive helped to secure the information needed to validate the information in the leaked memo. Everyone in this film was good and, of course, seeing the real Katharine Gun in film footage was perfect. Gregory Bernstein, Sara Bernstein, and Gavin Hood did a fantastic job of creating a compelling screenplay. Hood got terrific performances from the entire crew and actors.

Overall: This film is a potent reminder that we have to live our truth and be willing to stand up for what is right.

Colette

First Hit: With the empowerment of women being in the forefront, it was great to watch Colette take charge of her life.

Colette (Keira Knightly) becomes enamored by Willy (Dominic West) who is somewhat of a blowhard male chauvinist who disrespects everyone except anyone who has more money or prestige than him.

He contracts with people to write stories, books, and plays for him and because of his spending and gambling habits, he's always in debt. After their marriage he continues to have affairs with scores of women in Paris, which infuriates Colette but more for the lying than the affairs themselves. Because they are pressed for money, he locks Colette into a room to make her write for him.

She writes books that become the talk of Paris. Everyone loves the books and Willy, the supposed author, becomes the talk of the town. Setting social and artistic trends, Willy and Colette become enamored with their life. But, tension begins to percolate because Colette is the real author of the books and no one knows.

What I really liked about this movie is that Knightly, as Colette, is definitely in her element. Her natural wit and intelligence was never a match for Willy or Georgie Raoul-Duval (Eleanor Tomlinson), Collette’s first lesbian relationship.

Knightly was superb. Her airiness and ease of sharing a strong Colette was sublime. West was excellent as the overbearing chauvinistic husband and ego driven writer. Fiona Shaw was perfect as Colette’s mother supporting Collette’s independence. Denise Gough playing Missy, Colette’s supporter and romantic lover. Tomlinson was wonderful as Colette’s first lesbian lover who was also Willy’s lover. Richard Glatzer and Wash Westmoreland wrote a pointed and well-defined screenplay. Westmoreland did a good job of setting up wonderful scenes and sets that exemplified the era of the late 1800’s.

Overall: Using Knightly was inspired casting choice as she brought a lot of life and intelligence to this role.

Collateral Beauty

First Hit:  Wonderful concept, wonderful cast, mediocre execution.

The idea that someone could talk with Love, Time and Death is interesting. Having a cast with Will Smith (as Howard), Edward Norton (as Whit), Kate Winslet (as Claire), Michael Pena (as Simon), Helen Mirren (as Brigitte and Death), Keira Knightly (as Amy and Love), Jacob Latimore (as Raffi and Time), and Naomie Harris (as Madeleine) all in one film is amazing. However, there was something about the script and way it was directed that had this film fall short of its potential.

The title “Collateral Beauty” was also at fault in some ways. Normally when we hear the word “collateral” we hear it with the word “damage”. This term is used in the movie as a lesson or mantra that Madeleine hears after the loss of her child. When she was in the hospital, just prior to her daughter’s death, an old woman sitting next to her outside her dying child’s room said, do not be so taken by grief that you forget to see the collateral beauty. The movie does nothing to really show what this means.

The focus of the film is that Howard, who is a brilliant advertising creative executive, loses his young 6-year old daughter to a disease. The company he’s built with Whit, Claire and Simon begins to suffer and is now losing clients because of his disengagement with work. He spends his days building domino trails then knocking them down, or riding his bike at night through the streets of New York City. To save their company and investments Whit, Claire and Simon arrange to have Amy, Raffi and Brigitte pretend to be Love, Time and Death respectively in hopes of communicating with Howard to bring him out of his deep sorrow.

Although this is done with some seriousness, the constructs and building of the story is weak. When the words and concept of "Collateral Beauty" are passed from Madeleine to Howard, the failure to engage the audience and Howard are palpable. It is at this point I realized that this film, regardless of how it finishes, would be lack luster.

Smith was OK as the once engaging advertising company creator, leader and grieving father. Norton was slightly better as Howard’s business partner. Winslet was fine as the morally caring business partner. Pena was very good as the ill business executive who cares about his family. Knightly was good as Love. Mirren was very good as Death, her style brought strength to the film. Latimore was strong as Time. Harris was very strong as the grieving mother. Allan Loeb wrote a weak screenplay in that the characters lacked depth and the story never grew. Direction by David Frankel was weak in that he never saw the failings of the story to find ways to make it have more depth. The film never really shared the beauty of a child’s depth which, in this case, was supposed to be collateral.

Overall:  Although somewhat engaging at the beginning, it fails to fulfill any beauty collateral or not.

Everest (3-D)

First Hit:  Having read Krakauer’s book, the film was generally weak and disappointing.

I do not read many books that are tuned into films and I had read this book when it first came out.

Because it was some time ago, I hoped to just view the film without the prejudice of the book in the back of my mind. However, there was little or no back story as to why Scott Fisher (Jake Gyllenhaal) was the way he was. In fact the backstories were minimal and the attempt to build them during an evening when Krakauer (played by Michael Kelly) asked “Why” the climbers were climbing Everest fell far short of providing the needed information.

The audience needs to know why the characters are doing what they are doing - it is the primary set-up job of the director and scriptwriters. The gist of this story has too many people climbing Everest as part of their bucket list. With so many untrained and unskilled people trying to climb Everest we know something is going to happen.

Having been to Lukla, Namche Bazar, Tengboche and Kala Pattar, I’ve seen Everest reasonably close. I’ve seen hikers/climbers tossed onto the backs of Yaks to bring them expediently down the mountain because of altitude sickness. There just doesn’t seem to be enough respect for the mountain.

Rob Hall (Jason Clarke) had developed a company that took less experienced people up to the top of Everest. One of his rivals was Fisher. They are different in their attitude towards the mountain and they team up to try to get both their parties up and down the mountain safely. I heard this from the first time I hiked in to Lukla, “Everest makes its own weather”.

Having flown over the Everest from Gonggar airport in Lhasa, Tibet, seeing the way the wind whips across the top and the ridges the statement seemed so true. In this story a weather front comes in and seals the fate of many climbers who didn’t put their safety over the goal. There are great shots of Khumbu Icefall and the treacherous ladder bridges.

One of the best stories out of the book and one of the main stories in the film is of the rich arrogant Texan Beck Weathers (Josh Brolin) who ends up surviving the trek but ends up with a severe case of frostbite. The other sub-story is of the wives and supporting women of the men (and one woman) climbing the mountain.

The worst part of the film for me is seeing (and it is true) how much garbage and oxygen bottles are left on the mountain (from Base Camp on up) - lack of respect for nature.

Clarke was OK as Rob Hall. I didn’t believed his character but that could have been the direction. Gyllenhaal was OK, but with a lack of a backstory I just kept wondering why he acted the way he did. Kelly as Krakauer seemed like a very minor character, however his book raised the awareness of Everest and these climbers. Brolin was very good as the abrasive ego centric Texan. Emily Watson as Helen Wilton was strong as base camp manager. Keira Knightly was very strong as Hall's pregnant wife waiting for him to return for the birth of his daughter. William Nicholson and Simon Beaufoy wrote a weak script that really developed only 2 characters (Hall and Weathers). Baltasar Kormakur directed the film and given the intensity of the event and the decisions that were made, I was very disappointed in the result.

Overall:  This film did not deliver a very intense story.

The Imitation Game

First Hit:  The amazing acting tells a truly amazing story about belief and perseverance.

This is the amazing story of how Germany’s Enigma machine was decoded and used to assist the allies in winning World War II.

Alan Turing is featured here as the father of machines that think (the way machines think/process information – today we call them computers). As a young boy Turing (young Alex play by Alex Lawther) is a smallish, nerd who is picked upon by his fellow classmates. He’s smart and begins to discover his homosexuality through caring about, of, and for his one true school friend – Christopher.

During the war he’s asked to participate in decoding the German Enigma machine. He’s grouped with Hugh (Matthew Goode), John (Allen Leech), Peter (Matthew Beard), Jack (James Northcote) and then Alan finds and adds Joan (Keira Knightley) to the team. Each of them are good puzzle solvers, chess players and/or mathematicians.

Problem with this team is that Turing (adult Turning played by Benedict Cumberbatch) doesn’t work well with others. He believes that he can build a machine that will solve the problem and thinks trying to decode Enigma manually is a useless endeavor. He thinks working with a team will slow him down.

This is an amazing story and the acting is top shelf. However, the problem I found with the film is that it tells this story in three different time frames and juggles them in a way that didn’t work for me. I was fascinated by the young Turing, and as I begin to fully drop into this child’s experience, bang we’re in the 1950’s and he’s being arrested for homosexuality, then bang we’re back into the story of him building a machine to decode Enigma.

All three stories are great and the acting in them is great – it is the jostling of my emotions that I didn’t like by the way it moved from one story to another. However, all told it was an amazingly acted film that told a wonderful and powerful story.

Lawther is absolutely mesmerizing as the young Turing. His expressions and soulful eyes told a huge story. Cumberbatch as the adult Turing is stunning and embodied a man who understood problems and math far more than people. I loved the scene where he stated that he was always decoding because people never said what the meant. Knightly is, again, sublime. She’s perfect as the only bright light in Turing’s relationships with people. Goode is very strong as the chess master who learns to respect what Turing can do. Leech, Beard and Northcote are great in their supporting roles as code solvers. Mark Strong as the MI6 manager of this team is cunningly strong. Charles Dance is perfect as Commander Denniston the man who wanted to run a tight ship. Graham Moore wrote a strong script but he and director Morten Tyldum could have, in my opinion, made a better film if it was more chronological in nature.

Overall:  This was an excellent film sharing an amazing story about how World War II was shortened.