Churchill

Aeroflot advertised 'Dunkirk' but didn't actually have it. Instead I watched Churchill. I kind of hoped we'd get a full biopic showing unfamiliar sides to Churchill - how he went from a journalist to a dashing young war hero, his uncomfortable white supremacist views, his early political career. 

This follows just a few days during World War II in the run-up to D-Day. Churchill is vehemently opposed to beach landings at Bordeaux, remembering the disaster at Gallipoli. Everyone around him thinks he's had his day, and he's presented as past his prime, childish and impulsive. But also compassionate and a great leader. All of which is, of course, an entirely fictional scenario but works well for an underdog drama. Seeing Churchill as an underdog at the end of his life is pretty bizarre, especially when trying to pass it off as a biopic, but it makes for decent dramatic impetus.

This stuck to tried-and-tested elements, and didn't really give any insight into Churchill the man, actually making him seem very short-sighted and concerned with men he is immediately concerned with while being indifferent to those giving their lives that he's not thinking of, but certainly it allowed for bravura performances, particularly from Cox and Richardson. Richard Durden is also extremely likeable as Field Marshall Smuts, though what he’s doing acting as Churchill’s valet I cannot fathom.

Can't say it was the most compelling or moving piece of cinema ever, and though the period isn’t my area of expertise, I know enough about Churchill to know it was entirely made up and in personality terms a complete dramatic invention, but as an onscreen story it just about worked.