Not Gripping.

Rating: 4/10 (11 May 2020)

There seem to be many divided opinions on whether Mr Churchill was good or bad, certainly his opinions on gender, race and sexuality seem to differ greatly from my own, however this film is not about that. It is a snap shot of what happened during the month of May in 1940, but I'm still not sure I necessarily agree with his actions, although I was not there at the time and didn't feel what the people were feeling. One would have thought that we have now evolved passed this mentality of war, but it has just become more technical and statistical in today's age, so a lot of it is unknown to us and especially to me as I try to avoid the news to hold my depression at bay, but perhaps if I had been on the tube and the PM had come and talked to me, I would have chanted that I would fight for my freedom on my home soil, but for me right now I just don't can't see that fighting is a solution.
In this film, I think it would have helped if there had been more of a build up of things to show the feeling of the people and the events surrounding it, maybe more shots of soldiers or the everyday man at home, but it focussed purely on the man himself.
This film and its cast may have made a great tv series if it could have been spread out to include more of his years in service and if it had been shot with a view that he wasn't perfect, but he did do bad things as well as good, I think it could have been very good in that format, similar to Wolf Hall, which helped me to understand Henry VIII a lot better.
As a millennial I wasn't taught a lot about Churchill at school and haven't come across him much except in Doctor Who (Matt Smith) so a more in depth look at him, rather than a look at his quirky personality, in less than two hours, would have suited me better.
Mentions have to go to Gary Oldman, who did perform well and I have found a new appreciation for Kristin Scott-Thomas lately, having seen her in Nowhere Boy (2009) the other day, she doesn't have a massive part in this, but it seems almost effortless.
Enjoyable if you know enough about what was happening back then I'm sure, but not one I'd personally hurry to watch again.