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Posted: |
Feb 3, 2018 - 11:27 PM
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By: |
SchiffyM
(Member)
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I thought the score was effective enough, but this film (like "All the Money in the World") makes a fatal misstep to me toward the climax, when the filmmakers of a fact-based film presented something so outlandish that I assumed it had to at least have a basis in reality, because they couldn't possible make up something so absurd. But no, it was a complete invention. Liberties must be taken with the absolute facts in films like these, of course. But when something that seems on its face to be fraudulent turns out to be just that, all you're proving is that fiction is stranger than fact.
Oh, and Howard L., there's a lot of backlash over Oldman's nomination, given domestic abuse allegations against him seventeen years ago. (He denies them.) So if you like your house, you might want to cancel that bet.
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Posted: |
Feb 5, 2018 - 3:37 PM
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By: |
SchiffyM
(Member)
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For me the dramatic license taken here is no more than PATTON, LINCOLN or even THE SOCIAL NETWORK. Again I admit the power of Oldman's performance is what holds it together and gets the blood racing. AND may I say also Marianelli's score.
To me, it wasn't a matter of dramatic license. It was a matter of their invented scene being so cartoonish. Avuncular Churchill who's never been on a public bus bumbles his way into the underground, where he's greeted by a diverse assortment of wide-eyed Londoners with whom he starts a jovial conversation about their feelings about negotiating a peace with Hitler. Armed with their never-say-die spunk, he returns to Parliament and cites those ordinary people he met as the reason to never surrender. If you're going to make something up, it can't be something that feels so utterly false. To me, it completely undermined the real Churchill's actual achievement during that darkest hour.
I had the same issue with "All the Money in the World," which shows J. Paul Getty dying at the same moment his kidnapped grandson is rescued. Amazing that that happened! Except it didn't, he died years later. It's one thing to take liberties with the truth, but quite another to present something that seems so unlikely because, well, it is.
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Posted: |
Feb 6, 2018 - 1:55 PM
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By: |
Coco314
(Member)
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That fictitious scene reminded me very much of the title character sneaking out in the middle of the night and speaking to the young folk at the Lincoln Memorial in Nixon. Except that as outlandish as it seemed it really did happen. And I found the deliberate license taken in Lincoln annoying, for sure, and yet the film's impact was not diminished in the long run. This is also my sentiment re DH. Still, I concede if licenses were not taken it may have me respect both...a...teeny...bit...more. Nothing fatal as is, however.
I agree with Schiffy that the big problem is the enormous weight this phony sequence is supposed to have on the story. Lilly James' character was inspired by a secretary that worked for Churchill later on, but this I can accept. There were a lot of phony beats in "Imitation Game" also, way too much in my opinion.
Interesting point about Nixon, however.
In "All the money in the world" it threw me a little out, but I immediately took it just as a temporal condensation convention - after all both events did happen, just not at the same time and it is not a change that is that crucial to the story.
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Posted: |
Feb 9, 2018 - 11:41 AM
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By: |
Morricone
(Member)
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Based on the above I assume PATTON was a total joke. A compendium of the general's best and most absurd moments with scarcely another human being in sight.
I'm not sure what you mean, Morricone.
My only point is that when a movie presents something that rings false, and it turns out that's because it is false, that's a bad script. I've been watching "The Crown," and I know it takes some liberties, but nothing has stood out as fraudulent like that Underground scene did to me (and a few of the things that seemed unlikely in "The Crown" turned out to be true!). I actually think "Darkest Hour" diminishes Churchill by presenting one of his greatest achievements as being inspired by a bunch of caricatures.
My point is PATTON has everybody in the film simply showing up to point out another foible or quality of the larger than life general, the only interactions they have with him are there to do just that. Hence no one else is really fleshed out, right down to major historical figures like Bradley, Montgomery and Rommel. They end up as, well, caricatures if you please. It is part of the stylization of the movie. The films plays fast and loose with chronology and a lot of other details. The film makes up for it a number of ways including the incredible landscapes and palaces he is portrayed against, the oneliners that came from Patton himself, the sublime music that speaks multitudes of what transpires and, of course, Scott’s classic performance that is more than totally fleshed out.
THE DARKEST HOUR does some of the same stylization but not as much. Frankly pointing out the subway scene as the one unbelievable moment stumps me. It is a distillation of his encounters with the public, which would mainly come later and he would be famous for, but it is not so much off the mark as you may believe. War is a hard thing to get behind at any time. But Hitler’s blitzgrieg was particularly brutal and way too fast, the rumors of how he occupied his territories and his racist beliefs were not secret. I could not come up with a more perfect “monster” figure to fear. As others have said, if FDR were encountered the same way it probably would result in some of the same reactions as an act of confidence that HE was the leader to bring us through this torturous time. May I point out one person on the subway train questions what is going on and only those most enthusiastic come forward to introduce themselves. The handful of names that end up on that little list Churchill reads later are definitely not that whole car. Frankly I found the King’s reversal more abrupt but overall no scene took away from the power of one of the most inspiring films this year.
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Posted: |
Feb 9, 2018 - 12:36 PM
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By: |
SchiffyM
(Member)
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Morricone, all I can say is it didn't work for me. I'm not a Churchill scholar, but neither am I ignorant about the man. Recently, I went to the war rooms, and subsequently spent hours talking about him with an actor who portrayed him in a different project. I know he spoke to the public. In this particular instance, though, the weight given to this invented encounter just seemed silly to me. It didn't to you. I think we'll just have to agree to disagree about this one.
I had lunch Tuesday with a British friend (now living in the US) who happened to feel the same way as I did. But he also told a funny story. Last summer, he was in London, and Gary Oldman was a couple of tables away from him at a restaurant. The other Churchill movie of last year, starring Brian Cox and just named "Churchill," had recently opened, and Oldman was bemoaning it to whomever he was eating with, exclaiming "How many Churchill movies will people go see?!"
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Again, no more outlandish than the up close and in person reality of what the POTUS did that night with the young protesters. For me the only possible caricaturish aspect was the convenient cross-section of working classers. And yet stepping into a New York subway that's more than often what you get! Wouldn't it be the same with the London underground of that time period?