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The trick this film pulls off is that we all know how it ends. That’s how we are getting to see the story played out. Winston Churchill is a symbol of Britishness (for better or worse) because of the turn in the Second World War that resulted in an eventual allied victory. At the point of Dunkirk, however, the situation was awful and the Conservative Party was riven with chaos as Neville Chamberlain lost the support of the House, and a coalition government—and someone to lead it—was urgently sought. Anyone but Churchill, and probably Viscount Halifax—and a negotiated settlement with the Führer. Joe Wright ’s tremendous film takes this story and makes Winston Churchill into a brittle and maybe even flawed hero. Gary Oldman put on a fat-suit and chained expensive cigars in order to seem like the Churchill figure of legend. This Winston knows of his reputation: everything from the failure of Gallipoli to the support of Edward’s relationship with Wallis Simpson. Nobody in the gov...

Based on the group of ladies who contacted the BBC, leading to the excellent TV series, this is a typically British film: a successor to Calendar Girls and Brassed Off , and of course The Full Monty . It’s about what spouses do when their ‘other halves’ are fighting a war—the second Gulf War, in Afghanistan. And it’s a buddy film about the Colonel’s wife and the Regimental Sergeant Major’s wife. Kate ( Kristin Scott Thomas ) is the former: announcing herself immediately as important and in charge. Lisa ( Sharon Horgan ) is nominally in charge of morale amongst the families: she works in the base’s grocery shop and it monumentally low-key compared to Kate. Lisa has a teenage daughter who is frustrated by life on the base; Kate and the Colonel had a son who was killed in the previous Gulf War. This is why she is focused on taking everyone’s mind of their worries: she takes to it by recommending a choir and by learning how to conduct. Kate unearths a Casio keyboard and, althoug...