RED JOAN : Tuesday 11th June 2019.

'RED JOAN' which I saw earlier this week is a British spy drama film Directed by frequent theatre and occasional film Director Trevor Nunn. This film is based on the novel of the same name by Jennie Rooney which in turn gained its inspiration from the real life exploits of Melita Norwood, who worked at the British Non-Ferrous Metals Research Association from 1937 as a secretary, and supplied the Soviet Union's KGB with nuclear secrets for the following thirty years or so. The film received its World Premier screening at TIFF back in September last year, went on release in the UK and the US in mid-April, has so far taken US$8M at the Box Office and has garnered generally average Reviews.

We are first introduced to 80+ year old Joan Stanley (Judi Dench) as she potters about in her front garden pruning the hedgerows of her house somewhere in the English suburbs. She is a widow. It is the early 2000's and her peaceful uneventful existence is interrupted by a loud knock on the door. Opening the door reveals the British Special Branch accusing the octogenarian of treason, and promptly arrest her and take her in for questioning.

It soon transpires that Joan is accused of giving away Britain's secrets to the Russians from the late 1930's onwards, and in particular those secrets relating to the eventual building of the Atom Bomb. As the ageing Joan is interrogated in a drab and dreary looking room of course denying every accusation thrown at her, we are taken back to Joan's formative years in the mid-'30's when she was an aspiring physics student at Cambridge University (Sophie Cookson portraying the younger Joan).

The catalyst for Joan's change of direction in life comes late one night, when a knock on her dorm room window, reveals Sonya (Tereza Srbova) who wanting to avoid the curfew clambers in through the window, introduces herself to Joan, the pair chat briefly, she borrows Joan's dressing gown and exits the door to return to her own quarters. But in this fleeting exchange a partnership is forged that will have long lasting impacts upon the world. Grateful for Joan's assistance, Sonya invites Joan to a film screening where she meets her cousin, Leo (Tom Hughes) - a dedicated communist just like she is. The pair are instantly attracted to each other.

Taken in by the notions of social injustice, and also swept along by Leo's convincing soap box preachings, Joan quietly begins to join in the rallies and gatherings speaking out against Hitler. As the timeline progresses Leo accepts a three month posting to Russia to further his studies and help with his thesis.



During this time, Joan accepts a job at a top secret government laboratory for which she has to sign the Official Secrets Act. Working in the employ of Professor Max Davis (Stephen Campbell Moore) who wants a secretary with some knowledge of physics so that he can bounce ideas off and someone who can really contribute to the cause, so Joan is seen as the prefect fit.

Eventually their work and the progress they are making comes to the attention of the upper eschelons of the ruling political party at the time, who order Davis and his entourage to travel to Canada to undertake further work and research with Britain's Canadian allies. During the trans-Atlantic shipping trip, Max and Joan hit it off. Unlike the closely guarded Leo, Max is able to express his love for Joan, but is hampered in their relationship because he is married and his wife won't give him a divorce despite him asking several times in the past. It also is revealed that both Max and Joan share equal views of the world order at that time, but have differing opinions on how that order should best be implemented. Whilst in Canada the Ambassador arranges a visit for the pair to the University of Montreal, where Leo just happens to be lecturing and has caught wind of the pending visit.

Leo asks Joan to offer up the British atom bomb research to the Russians who at that time are seen as an ally to Britain, but Joan stoically refuses. The Russians are lagging behind in their research but it is only a question of time before they catch up. The Americans too are advancing at a steadier pace, but at this point in the second World War, the Americans can't be trusted, hence the Canadian research trip. Back on English soil and Max is keeping his distance from Joan because of a marriage he can't escape from, and Leo is back on the scene further hassling Joan about giving up her research secrets to the Russians. Joan eventually relents, but for her own personal reasons.

As Joan reveals during her stony faced interrogation, now accompanied by her son Nick (Ben Miles) acting as her legal counsel, Joan didn’t just pass on Britain's nuclear secrets as an act of devotion towards Leo, but the reality was that she took up an ideological approach made entirely of her own free will after seeing the catastrophic aftermath of the two atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, effectively bringing Japan's end to WWII and killing millions of innocents in the process. Her thinking was that only with access to equal information could the superpowers be all on a level playing field with each other, and prevented from such disastrous consequences in the future - as history attests too subsequently.

Leo winds up dead at the end of a noose tied around his neck although it is unclear if this was of his own volition, or aided by the KGB, and Sonya has disappeared overseas with her young child and husband. Max is imprisoned for passing on atomic bomb research secrets to the Russians, although all evidence against him is circumstantial and is unlikely to hold up in court. When the authorities come to take him away Joan is in the room too, but can't bring herself to come clean for the man she loves. Joan meets Max in prison and confesses to him that it was all of her doing. Max whilst initially is stunned by this revelation, loves Joan after all, and that too him is more important. Afterwards Joan meets with a high profile ministry friend William Mitchell (Freddie Gaminara) whom she basically blackmails (via a rather damning photograph into his sexual preferences) into pulling the strings to get Max released from prison and for them both to be granted new identities and put on a slow boat to Australia. 

Back in the present day and Nick is at odds with the truth that has been revealed about his own mothers secret life. Being frail and aged she asks her son to speak for her at her trial, but Nick refuses saying that he cannot support a traitor, even if that traitor is his mother. Later that day the Special Branch detectives come knocking and promptly arrest Joan for treason having drawn a satisfactory conclusion from their investigations to which Joan practically admitted to anyway. Standing outside the front door of her suburban home, and confronted by hordes of media and disapproving neighbours, Nick emerges, holds his mothers hand, and advises the gathered Press contingent to direct any and all questions towards him, as he will be acting on her behalf.  

In an end credits sequence we are told that the British Government never did press charges against Joan Stanley, and that she passed away some years later at the age of 93.

'Red Joan' is a slow meandering offering that is light on intrigue and tension but is just about saved by the performances of Sophie Cookson and Judi Dench, with the latter's role skipped by all to briefly and wasting her valuable talents. The film recreates the era well enough - from the drab muted colours of the interiors, to the dull overcast days to the sets design but the dialogue is fairly one dimensional and all adds up to a fairly mediocre take on a true story that could have been so much more. It's regrettable that this film doesn't ignite in a way other similar period pieces did with 'The Imitation Game' or even 'Their Finest' which really seemed to grasp their subject matter and run with it in inventive ways to capture the interest and the enthusiasm of the viewer. I was left wanting more from this film, which despite its strong cast and period lensing and costumery, is a film you might watch on a rainy weekend afternoon from the comfort of your home rather than blowing your $20 on the price of a cinema ticket.

'Red Joan' merits two claps of the Odeon Online clapperboard, from a potential of five.

-Steve, at Odeon Online-