Saturday 21 February 2015

A Pinoy At The Movies: The Imitation Game

These British actors are really good. First, there was Eddie Redmayne for Theory of Everything. Now, there's Benedict Cumberbatch for The Imitation Game (I haven't watched David Oyelowo in 'Selma' yet).

Luckily, before the Seollal holidays closed most of the cinemas in Seoul (I presume all cinema staff also need to be with their families), I was able to get one of the last seats available for the advanced screening of this movie at CGV Cinemas at Yongsan Station.

Just like Theory of Everything, which I saw late last year, The Imitation Game is about a real genius, Alan Turing. In the film, Turing reminded me of the fictional Sheldon Cooper of the The Big Bang Theory comedy TV series. Both geniuses seem to lack social skills and both look down on everyone else because they feel they're always intellectually superior. Of course, Sheldon Cooper is more famous than Alan Turing; Cooper has been a big hit on TV all these years, while Turing, well, I only knew about Alan Turing when this movie came out. Maybe because Alan Turing, who brilliantly cracked Nazi Germany's codes during World War II, actually worked on a project that remained a secret even after the war was over. 

Benedict Cumberbatch as the gay genius mathematician was as brilliant as his ideas, but too bad, this year at the Oscars, he is up against Eddie Redmayne, who I think will win the Oscar for best actor.

Keira Knightley played Turing's fiance. (Yes, he was gay but he had a fiance. To find out why, you have to watch the movie.) Although Knightley was good, I wondered why she is nominated for an Oscar best supporting actress. Isn't there any other actress who deserved that nomination? Perhaps, if Tilda Swinton's Madame D character in Grand Budapest Hotel had more scenes and screen time, she would have bagged that nomination. I think Knightley's part could have been played more credibly by another British actress, Kate Winslet. But even with this nomination, Knightley has no chance of winning the Oscar. She's up against Patricia Arquette for Boyhood. Patricia Arquette, who plays a psychic who can see ghosts of dead victims who help her solve these crimes in the TV series Medium, will win the Oscar for best supporting actress on Sunday.

As it is set during World War II, the movie scenes of the bombing of London also reminded me The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe when the children living in London had to evacuate to the countryside to save them from the constant bombing. I almost thought I would be able to see the four kids from that Narnia movie among the crowd at the train station scene.

Benedict Cumberbatch also plays Sherlock Holmes on a TV series Sherlock. And in this film, he plays a complicated character whose abilities and genius helped win WW II for the Allies. I recommend you watch this film and learn about Alan Turing and the other unknown heroes who helped shorten the atrocities of that war.

No comments:

Post a Comment