Country: GB/FR/US
Technical: col 100m
Director: Anthony Maras
Cast: Andrew Scott, Brendan Fraser, Kerry Condon, Damian Lewis, Chris Messina
Synopsis:
An RAF meteorological officer is seconded to Allied HQ one week before D-Day, to advise on the viability of a 'go' date.
Review:
Based on a play by David Haig, of all people, his tight little script actually works into an effective contest between pressurizing top brass and the doggedly determined, borderline autistic, scientist, Grp Captain Stagg; the classic story, then, of expertise threatened by sloppy implementation, à la Paul Newman in The Towering Inferno. As such the film plays somewhat fast and loose with the facts (the so-called 'gap in the weather' that permits landing on the 6th), and the central figure of Stagg is vindicated and rewarded with a happy ending. Nevertheless, the handling is sufficiently measured, and performances perfectly pitched, for these things to be overlooked. Besides, rather like in The Train (1964), the viewer enjoys being immersed in a specialised adjunct of the traditional war film genre.
Country: GB/FR/US
Technical: col 100m
Director: Anthony Maras
Cast: Andrew Scott, Brendan Fraser, Kerry Condon, Damian Lewis, Chris Messina
Synopsis:
An RAF meteorological officer is seconded to Allied HQ one week before D-Day, to advise on the viability of a 'go' date.
Review:
Based on a play by David Haig, of all people, his tight little script actually works into an effective contest between pressurizing top brass and the doggedly determined, borderline autistic, scientist, Grp Captain Stagg; the classic story, then, of expertise threatened by sloppy implementation, à la Paul Newman in The Towering Inferno. As such the film plays somewhat fast and loose with the facts (the so-called 'gap in the weather' that permits landing on the 6th), and the central figure of Stagg is vindicated and rewarded with a happy ending. Nevertheless, the handling is sufficiently measured, and performances perfectly pitched, for these things to be overlooked. Besides, rather like in The Train (1964), the viewer enjoys being immersed in a specialised adjunct of the traditional war film genre.
