National crisis
Darkest Hour DVD (£9.99, Universal Pictures, PG)
According to the oft-told national narrative, 1940 was a year when, despite military disasters, the collective will was for fighting on, alone and bloodied but unbowed. By focusing on the travails of Winston Churchill as spring gave way to summer that year, director Joe Wright and scriptwriter Anthony McCarten tell us a different story.
At the heart of the film lies Churchill himself, played by Gary Oldman in an Oscar-winning performance. Never mind the Nazis, here’s a man beset by rivals within his own government – men such as Viscount Halifax (Stephen Dillane) and Neville Chamberlain (Ronald Pickup), who make the case for negotiating with Germany. Moral support for a lonely Churchill comes from his wife Clemmie (Kristin Scott Thomas), King George VI (Ben Mendelsohn) and the people of London whom Churchill meets during a ride on the London Underground. The latter scene has attracted criticism for being both mawkish and historically inaccurate, but that overlooks a bigger truth. Darkest Hour reminds us that Britain carrying on the fight wasn’t predetermined, and that we impose patterns and narratives on history after the event.