Churchill Surrenders Talented Actors To Lackluster Storytelling

From time to time, a fascinating occurrence transpires in Hollywood filmmaking in that two films with similar plots get released in close order to each other. Think of how Deep Impact and Armageddon both were large-scale disaster movies about massive asteroids headed for Earth released between April and July of 1998. A pair of magician dramas from 2006, The Illusionist and The Prestige, provide another great example of this as does Olympus Has Fallen and White House Down choosing to tell action-packed tales of the White House being under siege. Of course, that whole Antz/A Bug's Life debacle of Fall 1998 is likely the most famous example of this. Our newest entry in this trend is a pair of Winston Churchill biopics released in the span of six months in 2017. One of them is Darkest Hour starring Gary Oldman, the other is Churchill and the latter happens to be the subject of this review.


Churchill makes the smart move of being a biopic drama that's all about a small portion of its non-fictional subject's life instead of trying to cram in everything and the kitchen sink into one feature. For this particular film, the focus is on the days leading up to that all-important World War II D-Day invasion and the actions of Winston Churchill (Brian Cox) are making it difficult for the other world leaders and their respective generals to get things in order for this event. Churchhill, motivated by his actions during the last worldwide conflict three decades prior, wants to be heavily involved in these proceedings, to the point that he wants to be on the front line of battle with the soldiers themselves.

This means we get to follow Winston Churchill as he learns some humility and the value of playing nicely with others. It's a simple character arc for a film that plays things too broadly and simplistic at the expense of being insightful about its lead character or the real world circumstances he was involved in. Supporting characters get no shades of depth to them and Churchill himself is rendered as basically just a loose cannon who gets results, dammit. That's why the times where we get inside Churchill's head in regards to how his earlier wartime efforts have affected him psychologically registered as the most stirring moments of the whole piece, it's the only time we truly get inside this man's head.

Failing to explore its characters and their lives in a thought-provoking manner leaves the cast assembled here completely wasted. Lord knows the talented Brian Cox could have easily been an excellent Winston Churchill, but all he gets to do here is yell a whole bunch, there's never a chance for Cox to use his talents to sink his teeth into a more insightful approach to Churchill. Miranda Richardson is left on the sidelines as Clementine Churchill, the wife of our lead character while John Slattery delivers disposable work as Dwight D. Eisenhower. All of these people are capable of so much more, why weren't they given just that here?

At least Churchill looks polished as a movie. Director Jonathan Teplitzky loves him some John Ford-esque wide shots visually emphasizing how certain characters are dwarfed by the situations they find themselves in. Aside from some clunky pieces of editing and a handful of scenes that do feel cheap-looking in terms of production value, Churchill looks nice for sure, especially thanks to the well-realized 1940's-specific sets and costumes, but it's all in service of a drab screenplay that can't find anything truly interesting to say about the historical subject it's adapting. I haven't seen Darkest Hour yet, but I'm having a hard time believing it'll dethrone Churchill as the Olympus Has Fallen of 2017's two Winston Churchill movies.