What do you get if you cross the movies Downfall and The Kings Speech?

Rating: 6/10 (18 January 2018)

Like many people who have watched and reviewed this movie, I think there is one thing we can all agree on, we wanted to see Gary Oldman play Churchill.
However for me I struggled to love the film, and even tough there are some great moments, even to go so far as to say there are powerful moments, I was left a little disappointed.
Early on I felt like I had seen this movie before but perhaps in another format, you could easily relate to movies like Downfall, The King's Speech and even Lincoln which all portray specific periods in one person's life be it their moment of victory or triumph or their demise and compare it to Darkest Hour. In those kinds of comparisons the movie does excel. As a historical piece it shows the moment of Churchill's appointment to the background cries of defeatism to the rallying cries of "WE SHALL NOT SURRENDER", and if your into that kind of thing there is a lot to like about this film.
However that being said their are times when its unclear what this movie wants to be, is it about Churchill the man, Churchill the Prime Minister, or Churchill the family man? In my opinion the movie fails because it tries to be all three and it struggles to do it, even with the fine acting of Gary Oldman. I often wondered if the scenes with the excellent Kristian Scott Thomas were necessary? They were few and far between and in some scenes she is on her own listening to the radio broadcasts of Churchill's speeches. Waste of good talent in my opinion and not necessary, perhaps the exception to this would be early on when Churchill becomes PM, but the speech about family sacrifice didn't really add to the narrative of the movie.
I felt the scenes involving Ben Mendelsohn deserve a mention as he was great playing George VI, I immediately felt the connection between the two characters and he plays an important role in the movie, and indeed in real life. We have only really scratched the surface of his role in WW2 with this movie and that of The King's Speech as he as well as Churchill were the embodiment of defiance especially during the Blitz.
There is a side of me that thinks that this is sort of a natural sequel to last years Dunkirk movie, as they both are set during the same months in 1940. I particularly liked the scenes showing the difficult decisions and unpopular decisions Churchill had to make, such as the brigade at Calais who were told your not getting rescued. I would have liked to have seen more of this, but it was short lived.
I think 6 out of 10 is a strong review, I don't think it deserves any more than that, perhaps maybe a weak 7 given how Churchill's makeup was done.