OPERATION MINCEMEAT : Tuesday 17th May 2022.

I saw 'OPERATION MINCEMEAT' at my local multiplex earlier this week and this M Rated British WWII drama film is Directed by John Madden whose previous film making credits include 'Mrs. Brown' in 1997, 'Shakespeare in Love' in 1998, 'Captain Corelli's Mandolin' in 2001, 'Proof' in 2005, 'The Debt' in 2010, and 'The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel' in 2012 and its sequel 'The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel' in 2015. This film is based on the book 'Operation Mincemeat : The True Spy Story that Changed the Course of World War II' by Ben Macintyre. This is the second feature film about the operation, following the 1956 film 'The Man Who Never Was' based on Ewen Montagu's book of the same name. This film saw its World Premier screening at the British Film Festival in Australia in November 2021 before its release in the UK in mid-April, and in the US (on Netflix) and here in Australia from last week, has so far grossed US$10.5M and has garnered generally favourable reviews. 

In April 1943 the UK is deeply rooted in WWII. Lieutenant Commander Ewen Montagu (Colin Firth) remains in England while his wife Iris (Hattie Morahan) and their two children leave for the relative safety of the United States. Ewen is a Jewish lawyer who is fearful that if they remain and Germany gains the upper hand and invades England, then his family will be persecuted. He elects however, to stay when he is appointed to the Twenty Committee (a WWII counter espionage and deception organisation of the British Security Service). His trusted secretary and good friend of Iris, Hester Leggett (Penelope Wilton) sticks by him.

Meanwhile, Winston Churchill (Simon Russell Beale) has made a commitment to the United States that her Allies will invade Sicily by July of that year in order to push northward through Italy and onward into Europe. Sicily though is considered an obvious target and is likely to be heavily defended by the German united armed forces. Admiral John Godfrey (Jason Issacs) informs the Twenty Committee that Britain must trick Nazi Germany into believing the Allies will invade Greece and Sardinia. Charles Cholmondeley (Matthew Macfadyen) proposes an operation from the Trout Memo (a document comparing deception of an enemy in wartime with fly fishing), which would involve a corpse carrying false secrets and washing ashore. Despite Godfrey's serious reservations, he gives Montagu and Cholmondeley permission to plan the operation with Lieutenant Commander Ian Fleming (Johnny Flynn).

The team set up an office under the name of Operation Mincemeat. As planning progresses Montagu and Cholmondeley finally obtain the body of a vagrant named Glyndwr Michael (Lorne MacFadyen), who died by suicidal poisoning. Bentley Purchase (Paul Ritter) was the physician who sourced the body of Michael, and helped preserve and prepare the corpse for the rouse. The team gives Michael the fake identity of Major William Martin, complete with a very detailed backstory, ID photos, and an engagement. A widowed secretary in the office, Jean Leslie (Kelly Macdonald), offers a photo of herself to serve as the fake fiancee under the name of Pam. Cholmondeley has a crush on Jean, but soon comes to realise that Montagu and Jean share a romantic connection which results in Cholmondeley becoming jealous and lashing out from time to time at Montagu.

Godfrey suspects that Montagu's younger brother, Ivor (Mark Gatiss), is in fact a Russian spy. He coerces Cholmondeley to spy on Montagu and, in return for which, Godfrey will locate and return the remains of Cholmondeley's brother, who was killed in action in Chittagong, Bengal. Cholmondeley reluctantly agrees.

A specialist MI5 driver is chosen to transport Montagu, Cholmondeley, and the corpse to the R.N. Submarine Base in Holy Loch, Scotland. The corpse is then loaded onto the submarine HMS Seraph. In the early hours of 30th April, the Seraph arrives in the Gulf of Cadiz and drops the corpse into the sea. It is later washed ashore and found by fishermen in Huelva, Spain. Operation Mincemeat attempt to get the fake documents to Madrid. The mission is however, hampered by bad luck, as the Spanish have resisted Nazi corruption better than anticipated. Captain David Ainsworth (Nicholas Rowe), the British naval attache in Madrid, meets with Colonel Cerruti of the Spanish Secret Police in one last attempt to land the papers in the hands of the Nazis. When Martin's personal items and the secret letters are eventually returned to London supposedly intact, a specialist at Q Branch figures out that the documents were indeed tampered with. This gives Montagu, Cholmondeley and the team hope that Germany retrieved the fake information.

Jean is ambushed in her own home at night and threatened by a man claiming to be a spy for an anti-Hitler plot within Germany. She tells him that Major Martin was traveling under an alias but the classified information was real. After he leaves, Jean informs Montagu and Cholmondeley. They come to believe that Colonel Alexis von Roenne (Nico Birnbaum), who controls intelligence in the Nazi High Command, sent the man to verify information so Von Roenne could undermine Hitler. However, they have no way of being completely sure. Montagu takes Jean to his home for protection much to Cholmondeley's chagrin, but shortly afterwards she accepts a job in Special Operations and leaves London.

On 10th July, the invasion of Sicily commences along the beach heads of the south-west and south. The news arrives that the Allied Forces suffered only limited casualties, the enemy is retreating, and the beaches have been held. They receive a message from Churchill soon afterwards saying 'Mincemeat swallowed. Rod, line and sinker'. 

Early the next morning, while sat outside on the steps beside the Duke of York Monument just off The Mall, Cholmondeley admits to Montagu that he received his brother's remains in return for spying on him. Feeling sympathetic and relieved that Operation Mincemeat was a success, Montagu offers to buy Cholmondeley a drink even though it's only 8:00 o'clock in the morning.

Before the end credits role, the closing epilogue states that Operation Mincemeat saved potentially thousands of lives, Montagu reunited with Iris after the war and remained happily married until his death in 1985, Jean married a soldier, Hester continued as Director of the Admiralty Secretarial Unit, and Cholmondeley remained with MI5 until 1952, later married, and traveled widely. Major William Martin's identity was revealed to be Glyndwr Michael in 1997 when an epitaph, with his real name, was added to Martin's headstone in Spain.

'Operation Mincemeat' is a solid enough WWII drama that moves along at a steady pace, has some stoic stiff upper lip performances from Firth, Macfadyen and Isaacs especially, and the production values setting the look and feel of early 1940's London is spot on. For a period piece centred firmly on espionage, intrigue, subterfuge and oneupmanship this films ticks all of those boxes, but is let down by the romantic triangle that Montagu, Cholmondeley and Jean Leslie find themselves in and from which no one comes out the victor. It is interesting to see all the early nods to James Bond as penned by Flynn's Ian Fleming, including Q Branch, M and a wrist watch with a built in buzz saw, and it was he who, after all, came up with the plan to stash a corpse full of 'top secret intelligence' to foil the Germans into thinking one thing while the Allies were doing something completely different - a stroke of genius that could have been lifted straight from one of his novels. Certainly worth the price of your cinema ticket, made all the more worthwhile knowing that this film is based on an extraordinary true story of deception and those unknown soldiers left at home to fight another kind of war from the shadows, but who nonetheless contributed to such a remarkable outcome to the war effort.

'Operation Mincemeat' merits four claps of the Odeon Online clapperboard from a possible five claps.

-Steve, at Odeon Online-

LOCKED DOWN : Tuesday 11th May 2021.

'LOCKED DOWN' is an M Rated romantic comedy heist film which I saw earlier this week. Directed by Doug Liman whose prior film making credits include 'Swingers', 'The Bourne Identity', 'Mr. & Mrs. Smith', 'Edge of Tomorrow', 'American Made' and 'Chaos Walking' most recently. The screenplay was written by Steven Knight in July 2020, financed, and filmed entirely during the COVID-19 pandemic over just an eighteen day period in October 2020 for a budget of about US$3M. The film was released in the US on HBO Max in January 2021, and has garnered mixed or average Reviews so far.

And so here, Linda (Anne Hathaway) and Paxton (Chiwetel Ejiofor) are locked down during the COVID-19 pandemic in their very cosy modern terrace house somewhere in London, sometime in the first half of 2020. They are a disgruntled couple who have agreed to go their separate ways once the lock down is over, for reasons of having grown apart after ten years together, although the stimulus for the break-up seems to rest more with Linda who has grown weary of Paxton's lack of enthusiasm, lack of focus and constant down at heal, woe is me attitude. For while Linda has climbed the corporate ladder to become the UK CEO of a very successful fashion company, Paxton has struggled to find meaningful work for the last ten years since he was arrested and charged with assault. As a result, his only work is that of a delivery driver, at which he has been furloughed because of the lock down. Paxton is forced to sell his beloved motorbike which he sees as an extension to himself, to make ends meet. 

On a Zoom call with Paxton's half-brother David (Dule Hill) and his wife Maria (Jazmyn Simon) in the US, Linda breaks the news of their pending separation, and we also learn that at some point in the recent past both Linda and Maria got it on together in a wine induced one night stand, which remains a secret between them, and which Linda would rather forget, but not so it seems on Maria's part. Linda meanwhile sets up a Zoom call with four of her UK based senior management team to advise them all that they are being terminated with immediate effect because of the economic downturn and the business being unable to sustain their positions moving forward, although in reality that decision was made pre-pandemic back in December at a company junket in Paris. 

One day while Paxton is feeling especially sorry for himself, his boss Malcolm (Ben Kingsley) calls him with the offer of three days work for £200 per day cash as a driver for high value deliveries, due to the limited number of drivers currently being available. The only catch is that Paxton will have to go under an assumed name because of his prior criminal record. He needs to make a snap decision there and then on the spot, which he does so reluctantly on the condition that Malcolm promotes him afterwards to an office based administrative role, after numerous years of dead end driving. Malcolm says that he'll have his fake security ID and name tag sent over to his home tomorrow (Wednesday) for his first collection from Selfridges on Thursday, Harvey Nichols on Friday and Harrods on Saturday. 

On Wednesday Malcolm contacts Paxton saying the he texted him his assumed name and that the security ID and name badge are on their way over. Paxton retrieves his new identity to discover that he has been given the name of Edgar Allen Poe, as was suggested by Martin (Sam Spruell) a Co-Worker of his who has spent the last seven years working in dispatch and there is absolutely no love lost between the two. Paxton is none too pleased with having to front up with the name of a famous 19th Century American poet and writer, but agrees to proceed nonetheless, surmising that todays 'kids' working security won't have heard of Edgar Allen Poe anyway. Meanwhile, Linda is on a Zoom call with her boss Guy (Ben Stiller) who is locked down in the Vermont countryside in the US together with the other CEO's from around the world. Guy offers her a new position back home in the United States to which she is taken aback and stalls her decision making process until after lock down has lifted to buy herself some time. 

Linda is tasked with clearing out her firms inventory from Harrods on Saturday evening, as there is now no-one else able to complete the task. After arriving home after his first pick up and drop off on Thursday, Paxton reveals that he has a job at Harvey Nichols on Friday and Harrods on Saturday. Linda quickly comes to the conclusion that their delivery schedules at the store overlap, and Paxton would not get past the security protocols that Linda set up three years prior when she worked there. Linda on Friday organises a call with the new Head of Security at Harrods, Michael Morgan (Stephen Merchant) who brings in her former co-worker Kate (Mindy Kaling) who paves the ways for Linda's almost uninterrupted access to the department store after hours the next day. 

Linda discloses to Paxton that there is a £3M diamond in the vault at Harrods that has been sold to an anonymous buyer, and the store keeps a duplicate on-display. That anonymous buyer Linda learns from Essien (Claes Bang) the owner of the company she works for, is a drug dealing, money laundering, probably murdering international criminal king-pin, and once the diamond is returned to a vault on New York's Wall Street will probably remain untouched and unseen by anyone for years. And so Linda and Paxton agree to take the real diamond for themselves and send the fake one to the buyer in New York City, splitting the sale between themselves and the National Health Service, three ways equally at £1M each. 

Upon making it to the famed Knightsbridge department store on Saturday evening, both under separate cover, Linda meets with former co-worker Charlotte (Lucy Boynton) at the security check in, with Paxton waiting outside to be ushered in. After some very loose checking in procedures, Linda and Paxton (Edgar Allen Poe) make their way to Harrods famed food hall which is being cleared out and closed down. There they help themselves to all the lavish ingredients for a £5K picnic up on the rooftop of the store before 7:30pm and their designated time for collection of the inventory and the diamond. 

Linda and Paxton retrieve the diamond from the vault and swap it out with the fake. However, they are confronted by Donald (Mark Gatiss), a former co-worker of Linda's she fired earlier in the week. Donald had alerted the Police after learning of Paxton's fake identity. Linda reveals their plan, and Donald agrees to lie for them, out of respect and love for Linda and being anti-establishment (especially at this time!). 

In exiting the store, a repeated message comes across the internal Public Address system for Edgar Allen Poe to return to the security gate immediately. Fearing the worst that the Police are lying in wait, the pair make a hurried dash for a security guarded rear entrance when Security Guard Mark (Marek Larwood) approaches brandishing Paxton's security ID that he left earlier at the main entrance, and promptly hands it over saying that he'll need it to gain access to Heathrow to put the diamond on the plane to New York. Linda and Paxton breathe a sigh of relief, and ride off into the night on Paxton's motorbike home via Heathrow Airport. 

The pair, who originally had planned to go their separate ways post lockdown, decide to reevaluate their relationship, now that they are each £1M better off and the burden of money woes, and both being stuck in jobs from which they gained no satisfaction, is effectively over. Then, on Paxton's birthday, the COVID lockdown is extended by another two weeks.

On the plus side 'Locked Down' works because of the chemistry and obvious good time that our two principle Actors, Hathaway and Ejiofor, clearly had during the making of this film, and watching a bunch of other A-listers phone in it via Zoom calls - Stiller, Bang, Kingsley and Merchant all adds a weight to the proceedings which should not be under estimated. The zeitgeist too is captured pretty well too with businesses shuttered, company layoffs, working from home, forced isolation, Zoom technical challenges, pot-clanging tributes, and the frustrations, anxieties and boredom of being holed up for two weeks and more in a confined space with the same person. On the down side the film really labours the ever declining relationship between Linda and Paxton during the first two-thirds, and then seems to remember that somewhere in the plot there is a diamond heist that needs to be crammed into the remaining third, and when it comes it is so underwhelmingly delivered and hurriedly conceived that it feels like an afterthought. But then I guess to write a script, get it financed and green lit, amass a cast and crew, go into production, shoot, edit and release a major motion picture in just about six months flat speaks volumes about what Director Doug Liman has been able to pull off, but also is telling as to what this film might have been given more time. It's not a great film, but it's also not that bad either.

'Locked Down' merits three claps of the Odeon Online clapperboard from a possible five claps.

-Steve, at Odeon Online-

THE FAVOURITE : Tuesday 8th January 2019.

'THE FAVOURITE' which I saw this week at my local Art Deco independent theatre, is made by Yorgos Lanthimos, the Greek film, video, and theatre Director, Producer and Screenwriter who here brings us this historical comedy drama offering that saw its World Premier screening at the Venice Film Festival back in late August, and where it won the Grand Jury Prize, and the Volpi Cup for Best Actress going to Olivia Colman. The film went on general release in the US in late November, was released in the UK on 1st January, has so far taken US$28M off the back of a US$15M production Budget, and has garnered widespread Critical acclaim. Lanthimos has enjoyed success more recently also with 'The Lobster' in 2015 and 'The Killing of a Sacred Deer' in 2017. The film was nominated for five Golden Globe Awards including Best Motion Picture of which it won one, for Olivia Colman as Best Actress in a Motion Picture - Comedy or Musical, and has subsequently picked up a total of 78 award wins and another 228 nominations from around the awards and festivals circuit, including thirteen recently announced BAFTA nominations.

Set during the very early years of the 18th century when England is at war with the French, and a frail 42 year old Queen Anne (Olivia Colman) sits on the throne suffering from gout, weight gain, and various other ailments - both physical and mental. She has very little interest in governing her lands and the machinations of the two political parties of the era and instead likes to throw lavish parties, have political guests almost run riot in her Royal household, and care for her seventeen rabbits whom she refers to as her children and which run around freely in her chambers. Each one of the seventeen rabbits represents each one of her seventeen children she had lost over the years, mostly though miscarriages and still births.

Acting as confidante, advisor, lover and practically surrogate Queen is Sarah Churchill, the Duchess of Marlborough (Rachel Weisz) who has considerable sway with the two political parties - the Whigs and the Tories, who mostly look to Sarah as the influential mouthpiece of the Queen, and who in turn they try to influence on matters requiring some direction or a decision.

Meanwhile, Abigail Hill (Emma Stone) arrives at the Royal household seeking employment, having been unceremoniously booted out of a horse drawn carriage at the gate. Abigail was an earlier woman of means, educated, and from a privileged background and upbringing. But for reasons of some poor business choices and a gambling habit, her father lost his good name and fortune and sold his daughter to a German in exchange for a settlement of his debts. And so Abigail has fallen on hard times. Abigail is brought into the Royal palace but as a scullery maid to work in the kitchen on menial tasks - washing pots and scrubbing the floor.

One evening however, Abigail is hurriedly asked to attend the Queen's bed chamber where she lays prone on the floor, and to apply bandages to a sore, infected and inflamed leg. She sees this as an opportunity not to be missed, and so takes a horse early the next morning and rides off into the forest in search of a plant remedy to ease the Queen's suffering, which she then applies in secret. When Sarah initially sees what Abigail has done, and without any permission or knowledge from the Queen (for she slept while Abigail applied the plant extract poultice), she punishes her and orders she be birch whipped for her insolence. However, the Queen's suffering is eased as a result of the remedy, and Sarah can see that her intentions were in fact genuine, so she halts the whipping, and out of gratitude makes Abigail her Lady-in-Waiting.

Robert Harley, the 1st Earl of Oxford and Earl Mortimer (Nicholas Hoult) is a member of Parliament and an influential landowner approaches Abigail with a view to her spying on Sarah and drip feeding him intelligence on what Sarah is scheming behind Royal closed doors, and as a means to sidestep her authority. Abigail initially refuses, but sometime later late at night witnesses Anne and Sarah in a secret lesbian relationship. As a result of this sighting, Abigail begins plotting her own rise to win the Queen's favour and reestablish her position in society.

Sarah becomes increasingly occupied with the war between England and France, at which her husband John Churchill, the 1st Duke of Marlborough (Mark Gatiss) is on the frontline battling it out for Queen and country. This is the opportunity for Abigail to foster a closer relationship still with Anne, which she does to good effect, ultimately becoming a sexual relationship. Sarah catches sight of a naked Abigail lying in bed next to Anne one morning, and as a result urges the Queen to have her sent away.

Catching onto this, Abigail spikes Sarah's tea a few days later just before she rides out on horseback. In the forest, Sarah comes to a steady halt on her horse, leans over, vomits and passes out, falling off the horse with one foot caught in a stirrup. The horse bolts dragging an unconscious Sarah through the rough undergrowth of the forest floor for hours until nightfall. Sarah is missing for a couple of days. Anne thinks that this is just a rouse on Sarah's part to make her jealous, and so she dismisses any suggestions of a search party, rather letting her stew in her own juices.

The Queen once again returns to Abigail as her favourite aided by her flattery and subservient attitude. The Queen's first gift to her new favourite is to be permitted to accept the marriage proposal of Samuel Masham (Joe Alwyn), a Baron of Queen Anne's court, which immediately reinstates Abigail's standing in society, aided by a gift of a two thousand pound dowry from the Queen every year from this point on.

Later Sarah comes round in a brothel where her wounds had been attended to do by the Madam of the house. She returns to the Royal household some days later badly scarred to her left cheek, battered and bruised and issues an ultimatum to the Queen to send Abigail away now once and for all, otherwise she'll leak very personal letters to the press that recount the secret affair between the pair. However, Sarah's ploy backfires and ultimately destroys the relationship that she had enjoyed for years with the Queen. As a result, Sarah is stripped of any power she once had, her privileges and her place in the Royal court, and is sent back to her own family home. Sarah then makes numerous attempts to write a letter of reconciliation back to Anne, and finally after finding the words, the letter is intercepted by Abigail and burned on the open fire before it reaches the Queen.

Abigail, as the newly appointed keeper of the Royal finances, reports to Anne that there seems to have been some impropriety in the financial records of the Royal palace, and Sarah appears to have syphoned off seven thousand pounds over recent years in favour of her husband. The Queen initially dismisses this notion, but upon reflection has Sarah and her husband banished from Great Britain. With Sarah now well and truly gone, Abigail's appetite for the good life start to get the better of her. Lavish parties, wild entertainment, rich foods, good wine begin to take their toll.

One day while Anne rests in her bed, and Abigail sits in a chair looking out of the window slurping on a glass of wine with seventeen rabbits running around, she deliberately steps on a rabbit squeezing it under her foot. The rabbit lets out a tiny yelp in pain and fear which is just enough to stir the Queen from her slumber, and for her to take grave offence at. Falling out of bed and scrambling to her feet, Anne steadies herself while Abigail rushes over to assist. Anne grabs Abigail by the hair and orders her to her knees and to start massaging her legs, just as though she were a lowly servant. In massaging the legs of the Queen, both parties seemingly readjust to a new order.

'The Favourite' is a lavish production - from the set design, to the costumes, to the internal and external surroundings around which the film is framed, and it packs a punch a whole lot more than its mere US$15M production Budget would suggest. This is a wickedly entertaining partially historical telling of the fractured relationships that unfolded in the Royal household of England circa 1708, and specifically between the three very manipulative, very strong, very driven female characters. There are some genuinely laugh out loud moments in this film, particularly a dance sequence at a party that has to be seen to be believed involving Harley and Sarah dancing like its 1999 in the Royal household - hysterical! And the use of the 'C' word gets plenty of airing in the film too - hence its MA15+ rating. Lanthimos succeeds in ticking all the boxes - from the striking performances of the three female leads Colman, Stone and Weisz who all demonstrate jealousy, anger, cunning and a nervous tension in equal measure, and from Hoult too; to the production values; to the witty, intense and always sharp dialogue; to the score; and the storyline whilst grounded in historical fact also adds more than a dash of fictional poetic license. And why not, when it all adds up to a film as commendable as this. See it on the big screen while you can, and see for yourself what all the buzz surrounding this film is about.

'The Favourite' merits four claps of the Odeon Online clapperboard from a possible five.

-Steve, at Odeon Online-