Quit Whining, Brits--It's Truer than You're Admitting!

Rating: 9/10 (30 October 2002)

Again and again... 'It didn't happen... The Brits captured the Enigma Machine First.' They did. THEY JUST WOULDN'T LET THE U.S. NEAR IT! The United States Naval Cryptography division made a deal to share two of the 'Purple' machines they had built with the Brits in exchange for one of the TWO the British had, ONE captured by the POLES and sent to England while Britain and France watched Poland fall. The British reneged on the deal. Sorry, Yank, but we jolly well DON'T care if you have one, not our chaps being sunk, and all that...
And so an American destroyer team trained and trained for a special mission to force a U-Boat to the surface and capture it and the Enigma on board before the Germans could scuttle it. DOES THIS SOUND FAMILIAR? Want some proof? Go and see the U-505 in the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago. But, perhaps y'all'd rather whine and bad mouth the United States. It does seem to be a popular hobby. So, the U.S. had to go and get its own Enigma machine. This is a fictionalized account of all that, and tremendously entertaining. Under the circumstances, it's not something the Brits should be mentioning. It's stuff like this that lets you see how far Europe IS falling. The movie is taut, well-directed, well-acted, reasonably accurate historically with modifications. A lesson on the basic nature of military command is better put here than in many other movies. Given all that, I can't understand why the rest of the world hates this movie so much. After all, it's such an excuse to bite the hands that saved you.