Darkest Hour critique- a review by EskimoTV

Full text transcript of the Darkest Hour critique

Shooting at an Eskimo TVE, your home for icy and chilly movie reviews.

I’m your host, Jason Escamilla, and I’m your co-host, David Scott, lead editor and critic at Critical Truth.

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As always, this review is going to be spoiler free and we’re going to avoid talking about anything that isn’t already in the trailer.

Today, we’re reviewing Darkest Hour, directed by Joe Wright. We get to see into the incredible life of Winston Churchill, who is outstandingly portrayed by Gary Oldman during May 1940. Adolf Hitler’s army is infiltrating Europe and Churchill must decide whether to settle conflict by negotiating a peace treaty or fighting for the ideals of Europe by entering World War Two.

After watching this movie, I feel like the core purpose of the film was to show off Gary Oldman performance, and I can see why they would choose to go that route. He completely disappears into the role and he carries all of the best parts.

Yeah, definitely. I love his performance and I really felt drawn into this era as everything looks like it should from that time period, from the props to the attire and the environment, it looks like twenty seventeen technology and cameras were taken back to that era and shot everything that has seen. Everything looks fantastic and exactly as it did in the nineteen forties.

You know, I’d agree that next to his performance, the attention to detail in the environment is excellent that I could call this sets a character. I would because they’re absolutely oozing with personality.

Yes, definitely oozing with lots of personality. However, I’m not a big history buff and I will say that I personally did not find this plot appealing despite Gary Coleman’s performance, which I agree was fascinating and stunning. I was bored during some parts of the movie, and I will say that my opinion is probably unpopular because I know lots of people who love this movie and some even consider this one of the best films of the year and for good reason. It has a great performance and accurately and effectively depicts a very interesting time period. But I do think that there will be others out there that do not find history films to be appealing.

And I will say that if that is the case, then this film may not be a film that you want to watch if the premise of the movie intrigues you, a film about vital events leading up to World War Two, then you will enjoy this movie.

You know, I would agree with you that I don’t think the movie is as good as I had previously heard, though I would say for different reasons. I don’t think you should have to be a big history buff to enjoy a well-made film. I think there is a larger issue here with the overall quality. It had frequent injections of exposition that often didn’t even contribute to the plot.

And while the decent movie can get past this, I have to say that there were a few points where they tried to connect the emotional core of the movie to moments that were entirely propped up by that dialogue. I enjoyed the film, but only barely so, and only because Gary Oldman charisma and presence for lots of films where conflict exists.

I like to be in suspense. I want to wonder like what’s going to happen? Are these characters going to be OK? And it’s really tough to do that with the historical film for me personally, because we’re on the other side of that. There’s no feeling of what’s going to happen because I know what’s going to happen. They are going to go to war. And while this movie did have standout moments from Gary Oldman that draw me back in and caused me to want to listen to what he’s saying because he is playing this character so well, just the premise and lack of action sequence made it for me feel like a bit of a drag in some moments.

Now, you know, I challenge that by saying that I think a historical film can find a lot of really deep emotion in the moment. They can connect us with characters by showing us what it felt like to be in their shoes. And at their best, they can make us feel the very doubt that the main character feels. And I think that was the biggest thing for me here. I have heard Churchill’s speeches before and hearing the real thing moves me emotionally. But the film they built around darkest hour prevented me from feeling the same way over the very same words that I’ve heard in real life. And I think the poor construction is most to blame for how the movie fails to get you invested in what’s happening.

Something else I want to just a minor know is that this takes place in Europe. So everyone in this film has a very strong British accent and I probably didn’t do that. Right. But anyways, I understand what the characters were saying, but I had to really pay attention. And every now and then there would be a word or two that I’d miss or ask that he say this or did he say that? And that really can’t be a negative because these characters had to speak that way or wouldn’t been true to the culture of that era. But I thought it pointed out. So people can know going in that these characters do have a very strong accent.

I know you’re conflicted about that. Yeah, I would totally agree that Gary Oldman character was the worst. There were moments when I absolutely didn’t understand what he was saying. And, you know, even though it was set up as part of the movie that he was a mumbler, his performance captured that to an extent where I couldn’t understand what he was saying from time to time. And I don’t think that really excuse the film to make parts of the to make parts of it difficult to understand. I think it should communicate.

Well, definitely. I’m I’m glad I’m not the only one that feels that way. I’m giving this a five point five out of ten wasn’t my favorite, but it had great acting.

What about you? You know, I’m going to give this a six out of ten, OK? I’d say this was worth watching for the interesting and entertaining portrayal of Churchill by Gary Oldman, but there’s just nothing else around that.

Yeah. That’s going to average out to a five point seven five on the icy and chilly meter for darkest hour. What’s your favorite Gary Oldman performance? And did you enjoy this movie called Below? And let us know what you thought about it.

And once again, I’m David Scott of the Critical Truth. And if you’re interested in seeing more of my work, please check out my link in the description below.

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