A surprisely above the average "biography" film

Rating: 9/10 (15 February 2018)

Ok, I know that this is not exactly an biography movie, but you know, it's the history of a short lifetime period of a real guy, who did great things, so it's in a way, a biography.
And, once again (like we get with Battle of Sexes) we have some really above the average biography here. I think that do a biography movie is something really tough to do, so not every director can, but here, Joe Wright does a great job.
The movie is very good, the approach of Churchill's life, and how the world simply fell on his shoulders in like two weeks is fantastic. It's also amazing to see, how "weirdly" this movie and Dunkirk in a way complete each other, every time they talked about Dunkirk, I "knew" how badly thing were back than. The conection, even thoght it was not something planned, is amazing.
So the script is pretty decent, the speeches are fantastic, and some Churchill's scenes are remarqueble. The acting is just stunning, Gary Oldman is a monster, there isn't another way to describe he in this role, the guy is a legend, give him an Oscar. But also, the supporting cast is extremely competent here, Lily James give us a solid performance, with such a charism, even though she hasn't many lines throught the movie. Ben Mendelsohn is great as King George, Stannis Baratheon (just kiding) is very good too. Anyway, you get it, the cast is awesome.
The soundtrack is ok, the montage is interesting, with some different styles, using like the calendar popping up on the screen, to show us how much time pass.
Probably the only issues that I have with the movie is regarding the filming style, I think that the movie is great shoot, but sometimes the director seems to go a little bit over the top in some scenes, like the close up in the hands of the boy, or some going back shoot of the top of a building, anyway, is just a little thing. Also I think that the overuse the "motivation speech" on Churchill's life, I don't know how much there is true (and this why is hard to judge) but every once in a while some one as to say some motivation words to him. Again, is not a big flaw, but those thing prevented the movie to be a 10/10 one for me.
In short, Darkest Hour is a great film, and deserves to be in the Oscar run. Gary Oldman gives the best performance from him that I ever saw. And one really big plus is the powerful and great history that the movie tells, one of the most important figures of mankind in modern times, for sure.