Four stars. Rated PG-13, and rather harshly, for mature content and occasional sexual candor
By Derrick Bang
Mankind has an unfortunate
tendency to devour its champions. Always has, likely always will.
We’re also not very tolerant of
those who are different, whether in appearance or behavior. During times of
crisis, such eccentricities are regarded even more suspiciously.
Norwegian-born director Morten
Tyldum’s handling of The Imitation Game
employs shaming and ostracization as dramatic plot points: issues every bit as
significant as the WWII-era predicament that brings young mathematician Alan
Turing to the unusual code-breaking operation at Buckinghamshire’s Bletchley
Park.
As scripted by Graham Moore and
depicted by star Benedict Cumberbatch, Turing is a social outcast by virtue of
his utter obliviousness to decorum and protocol. He affects a level of bland
arrogance that infuriates everybody, yet remains utterly bewildered by how he
is perceived by others.
This characterization places
Turing squarely “on the spectrum,” to acknowledge the phrase du jour ... and I can’t help feeling
that this artistic decision may have been propelled more by our current
fascination with such characters — think Hugh Laurie’s Dr. Gregory House, or
Cumberbatch’s own modern spin on Sherlock Holmes — than by authenticity.
This film’s opening credits are a
bit deceptive, implying that Moore concocted this screenplay on his own. Only
when we hit the closing credits can sharp-eyed viewers spot, in tiny print, a
reference to Moore’s script being adapted from Andrew Hodges’ 1983 biography, Alan Turing: The Enigma. And while
Hodges drew upon ample sources to confirm Turing’s impatience with bureaucracy
and the grinding sluggishness of the military chain of command, Moore’s
decision to re-cast this as full-blown autism is ... well ... historically
suspect.
That said, it allows Cumberbatch
to inhabit another of his fascinating, eccentricity-laden characters: a fresh
performance that never ceases to be both fascinating and entertaining. Tyldum
clearly recognizes this, choosing to open his film with Turing’s initial
interview in the office of Bletchley Park Commander Alastair Denniston (Charles
Dance). It’s a hilarious, impeccably timed display of rat-a-tat dialogue
between an increasingly annoyed Denniston and the calmly indifferent Turing.
Indeed, such unruffled disdain
later leads to the film’s funniest line, when one of Turing’s colleagues
comments, in the aftermath of a particularly blunt display, “Popular in school,
were you?”
Likely not, but that’s hardly the
point; Turing’s unlikely presence at Bletchley Park, juxtaposed against the
increasingly importance of his work, is what makes this film so engaging.
Turing is a 27-year-old Cambridge
scholar when he travels to Bletchley Park in 1939. He journeys amidst chaos:
London families are separating at the train station, their children being sent
to the greater safety of country surroundings, in anticipation of the blitz to
come.
Bletchley’s core mission is to
break the impenetrable German “Enigma” code, which has defied all Allied
efforts. Until and unless Enigma can
be deciphered, the Allies have no way of knowing when or where German planes,
ships and u-boats will strike.
Bletchley Park has a captured
Enigma machine, but that doesn’t help at all, given its oft-stated capacity for
“139 million million” settings. To make matters worse, the Germans alter these
settings every 24 hours ... meaning that any code-breaking solution must be swift
enough to adapt to each day’s changes.
Turing finds himself among a
small cadre of colleagues dominated by the charismatic Hugh Alexander (Matthew
Goode), a chess champion with a flair for probability and a talent for
leadership. Trouble is, Turing can’t submit to being told what to do,
regardless of the circumstances; while Alexander and the others work the
problem one way, Turing closets himself in a corner, sketching and scribbling
the details of what soon will become a truly fascinating electromechanical
machine.
Production designer Maria
Djurkovic does a sensational job with this behemoth of drums, rotors and
wiring; look up any photograph of the actual “bombe” — the British device’s
actual name — and you’ll see precisely what Turing concocts in his workspace.
The notion that anybody could devise such a gadget, and that it could work,
almost defies credibility ... and yet that’s precisely what happened.
(But not entirely on his own.
Turing was assisted greatly by celebrated British mathematician and Bletchley
Park cipher expert Gordon Welchman, whose involvement with breaking Enigma has
been overshadowed by Turing ... and who is completely absent in this film.)
Turing dubs this growing
monstrosity “Christopher,” in a nod to Christopher Morcom, a boarding school
classmate who becomes young Alan’s best friend and protector. We watch this
relationship expand during a series of 1928 flashbacks, with Christopher (Jack
Bannon) granted the telling gesture of giving the withdrawn, crossword
puzzle-obsessed Alan (Alex Lawther, in these scenes) his first book of ciphers.
This relationship with
Christopher also establishes the basis for Turing’s homosexuality: a
“peculiarity” that was not granted the acceptance gays enjoy today. To that
end, Tyldum and Moore employ a framing device for their narrative: a 1952
police station interview with Detective Robert Nock (Rory Kinnear), following
Turing’s arrest for “gross indecency.” The film unfolds as Turing tells his
story to Nock: a sort of test he has devised and dubbed “The Imitation Game,”
as a means of determining whether machines can think.
The core point here is
deliciously subtle: Is Turing a man, despite his social ineptness, or a
soulless machine? We’re left to judge the answer on the basis of his unfolding
story, just as Nock does.
The other key player in this
drama is Joan Clarke (Keira Knightley), a vivacious young woman with a flair
for mathematics and cryptanalysis. She excels during a “recruitment drive” that
Turing orchestrates, and he immediately views her as vital to his work.
Unfortunately, Clarke’s conservative parents refuse to permit her to work in an
all-male environment, so Turing concocts an elaborate ruse that brings her to
Bletchley Park with her parents’ blessing.
Clarke becomes the calming
element in Turing’s life, softening the rough edges so that his colleagues
begin to receive him with amused forbearance. Here, too, Cumberbatch excels at
Turing’s clumsy efforts at peace-making, stammering his way through a badly
told joke, but persevering to a punch line that he more or less ruins. But it’s
an effort nonetheless, and we cannot help smiling at Cumberbatch’s nervous
apprehension, as he looks around the room to see how his gesture has been
received.
Knightley’s performance may be a
bit too 21st century emancipated, but that just makes her portrayal of Clarke
more delightful. She’s spunky and charming, yet capable of erupting with temper
whenever challenged by some oblivious man simply because of her gender.
Dance is appropriate haughty and
dismissive as the villain of the piece, Denniston forever unwilling to grant
Turing the benefit of any doubts. In
that regard, Denniston represents standard-issue “movie conflict,” a stereotype
that Dance handles with aplomb and angry bite.
Mark Strong has an intriguing
supporting role as Stewart Menzies, a mildly sinister MI6 “spook” better able
to appreciate Turing’s value to the war effort. Allen Leech, immediately
recognized as Tom Branson on TV’s Downton
Abbey, plays the genial John Cairncross, the first of Turing’s colleagues
to offer what feels like genuine friendship.
The film is greatly enhanced by
another of composer Alexandre Desplat’s rich orchestral scores. Desplat weaves
several themes throughout the narrative, augmenting and even establishing mood
and atmosphere. I truly believe he’ll eventually be regarded with the same respect
we currently show John Williams.
This depiction of Turing’s life
is gripping both for the significance and gravity of his Bletchley Park
activities, and for what happened to him after the war: a sad, shameful fate
for a man who served his country with such distinction. Cumberbatch makes
Turing an at-times unforgivably flawed yet undeniably noble protagonist: a
tragic Shakespearean figure that we admire in spite of himself.
We’ve seen a lot of Bletchley
Park since most of its activities were declassified (although some of the
code-breaking algorithms remain secret to this day). Derek Jacobi portrayed
Turing in a stylish 1996 BBC production of Breaking
the Code, adapted from the actor’s starring performance in Hugh Whitemore’s
1986 play. Dougray Scott’s Thomas Jericho was Turing in all but name, in 2001’s
Enigma. More recently, writer Guy
Burt undoubtedly used Joan Clarke as a model for his four amateur female
sleuths in 2012’s thoroughly ludicrous The
Bletchley Circle.
Those efforts aside, The Imitation Game is likely to stand
the test of time, remaining the prime cinematic depiction of Turing and
Bletchley Park. Cumberbatch deserves credit for that, and so does Moore.
Although the latter takes liberties with established fact — for example, Turing
and Cairncross never worked together — the broad strokes are accurate, and we
get a solid sense of Turing’s complicated, exciting and ultimately heartbreaking
life.
Like all riveting films, it made
me want to know more about its characters and setting. Starting with Hodges’
book, of course.
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