'The Imitation Game' = only Alan Turing's Absolute brilliance as Logician could break the 'Enigma' code (and save millions of WWII lives).

Rating: 9/10 (29 June 2019)

The 2014 film 'The Imitation Game' and the story of ultra-brilliant 'outsider' Alan Turing is important and fascinating in a number of ways. On the large-scale it presents the positively incredible concept that sheer 'brainpower' could in effect undermine/defeat the fiercest of armies (i.e. Nazi Germany) = by breaking/decoding the unbreakable 'enigma' code-transmissions, providing the Allies with vital information on movements of enemy warships, bombers, etc.
The decoding-effort was thought by many to be virtually impossible, but Alan Turing made the intellectual 'jump' head-long towards the direction of designing one of the first 'thinking-machines' (soon to be know as computers), to tackle the seemingly insurmountable feat! The artificially-intelligent Turing-machine came through with flying-colors and made the world safe for people that just wanted to live in peace, freedom and civility (or did it?!)
That's the great irony of Alan Turing's authentically tragic story, His unprecedented brilliance and ultra-creative logical successes, probably won the War for our free-World (or at least shortened it considerably), and saved millions of innocent Lives - but unfortunately the still archaically-unsympathetic (irrationally-cruel) Laws of his own British-Isles homeland (as of the early 1950's) essentially sealed his dire fate, facilitating the taking his own life thru cyanide poisoning (by not allowing him to be judged solely on the 'content of his own character' - subjecting him to a brutally-inhuman 'chemical-castration' which probably hindered/ interfered with his previously astonishing powers of concentration - and also not giving him full credit (at the time) for his astoundingly crucial code-breaking achievements during WWII (partly because his achievements were highly classified in the midst of a burgeoning 'Cold-War').
It seems doubly ironic now, in the age of I-Pad/I-phone, where even the 'common-person' places essential reliance on these 'thinking machines' = that might never have come into existence if not for Alan Turing (and other key artificial-intelligence 'founding fathers' like John Von Neumann and Marvin Minsky).
Actor Benedict Cumberbatch gives a positively uncanny performance as Turing = fully-transmitting Turing's other-Worldly 'outsider's' brilliance (as well as his palpable social awkwardness).
If I had a slight critique, its in the pacing and 'focus' of this film = I think the drama builds well in the second-half, with some extremely powerfully moving scenes towards the end) - but some of the early scenes seem a bit unfocused (and unfortunately the earlier scenes between Cumberbatch and Keira Knightly seem to lack sufficient 'chemistry' and seem a bit 'forced' although I have to say that their final scenes together are quite emotionally-resonant!
Overall, I enjoyed this movie and found much of it quite insightful - just wish Alan Turing himself could have been cognizant of how much his ground-breakingly original ideas about artificial-intelligence have genuinely shaped/influenced our 21st Century, and beyond!
note: Charles Dance gives a brilliantly intense & intimidating portrayal as 'Commander Denniston' = Alan Turing's bureaucratic superior and foil thru much of this film!