By William Wolf

THE IMITATION GAME  Send This Review to a Friend

One of the best films of the year and one of the best performances of the year, definitely meriting Oscar consideration, is “The Imitation Game,” which was shown at the 2014 Toronto International Film Festival, where it won the People’s Choice Award, given according to votes by the public seeing the many movies in the festival, and is now in commercial release.

“The Imitation Game” tells an exciting story involving the breaking of the Nazi Enigma Code in World War II, thanks to the tenacity and genius of Alan Turing, a Cambridge mathematician, who is brilliantly and complexly played by Benedict Cumberbatch. The film has been superbly directed by Morten Tyldum from a well-written, colorful screenplay by Graham Moore.

In addition to the effective supporting cast, there is a standout performance by the appealing Keira Knightley as Joan Clarke, a woman who is part of the code-breaking team as well as a woman whom Turing falls for and wants to marry. But Turing is a homosexual, which at the time was illegal in Britain, and a major part of the story is how his heroism in breaking the code is overlooked after the war and he is persecuted for under the law for being gay, with a tragic, heartbreaking result. He escaped prison only by agreeing to undergo chemical castration. He soon committed suicide. The film, however, concentrates on his World War II achievement.

(In December, 2013, Turing was pardoned by Queen Elizabeth.)

Other key cast members include Matthew Goode, Rory Kinnear, Charles Dance and Mark Strong. The film works on the suspense level as Turing and his colleagues race against time to break the code and thereby save thousands of lives. It also works on the intensely personal level involving the intricacies of Turing’s personality, his stubbornness and this genius in envisioning an early version of the computer to decipher the code and enable the allies to intercept enemy operation al plans.

There is also a moral issue—the holding back of using decoded information that could immediately save lives so as not to let the Germans know of the breakthrough and thereby save more lives in the future. The film also dramatizes the infighting, with Turing having to buck brass impatient at spending money with no results yet and no confidence in what Turing was doing.

An inquiry into the possibility of a spy within the group becomes another issue. The ambience of wartime England is captured and is rich in the recreated atmosphere of the Bletchley Park location dedicated to the code-breaking operation. The story comes vividly to life via the development of the challenges and personalities at play. The result is always compelling, and the film emerges as not only among the best of the year but among the most important for paying tribute to one of the war’s great heroes. A Weinstein Company release. Posted November 28, 2014.

  

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