OPERATION MINCEMEAT [2021]

Operation Mincemeat (2021)
Directed by: John Madden
Written by: Ben Macintyre, Michelle Ashford
Starring: Charlotte Hamblin, Colin Firth, Jason Isaacs, Kelly Macdonald, Mark Gatiss, Matthew Macfadyen, Penelope Wilton, Rufus Wright

OPERATION MINCEMEAT [2021]
Director: John Madden

What a title, and what an operation. World War 2, the bigger budgeted sequel to no-ones favourite, World War 1, and the Allies are planning a deception operation in prelude to the Allied invasion of German held Sicily, fool the Germans into thinking the attack will happen on Greece and Sardinia and then surprise the Third Reich.

War movies, specifically those based on true stories (sorry Quentin Tarantino), have always held a special place in my heart. War is perhaps the most revealing time for humanity because you will see everything from the gravest acts of cruelty and cowardice to acts of heroism that stagger the heart and mind. With that said, Operation Mincemeat does not always contain the tension of most war movies, but it does serve to highlight one of the wars oft forgotten episodes.

The premise focuses on the real-life tale of British officers planting misleading documentation on a corpse for the Germans to “find” in the hope they will buy into the ruse and mis-deploy their forces ahead of Allied action. Sounds simply, right… right?

The film stars Colin Firth as Ewen Montague, Matthew Macfadyen as Charles Cholmondeley and Kelly McDonald as Jean Leslie. Jason Isaacs puts in a good turn too as no-nonsense Admiral John Godfrey. There’s even Johnny Flynn portraying a young Ian Fleming (the author behind the James Bond Books and we will be getting to him).

One thing to note is that whilst the male cast predominantly portray historical figures, the female cast do not. No prizes for guessing why, and whilst I appreciate that the film is not ‘pure’ in its depiction of historical events (I grew up watching Mel Gibsons “Braveheart”, trust me, the bar has been set low), I don’t mind the retro-active misrepresentation the film-makers chose to go with. Does it make wartime Britain look better than it was, perhaps, but that’s not the reason behind the inclusion of fictitious female characters in this factual tale. There is a love triangle between Colin Firth, Matthew Macfadyen and Kelly MacDonald. All three actors fundamentally portray a form of unrequited love, they all want someone that they cannot have. Kelly McDonald wants Colin Firth, Colin Firth wants Kelly McDonald and Matthew Macfadyen wants Kelly MacDonald (the characters, not the actors – though who knows). It adds an interesting layer to the film which, for a war movie, does not otherwise see a lot of “action”. I enjoyed the love triangle far better than the one I was force fed in “The Hobbit” trilogy, and found myself genuinely wondering what was going to happen. My only concern is that for our two male leads – what would the real-life men they are portraying have thought of this entirely fabricated depiction of their private lives? Tough to imagine that the word “invasive” wouldn’t be used. Same goes for their surviving family members. I sincerely doubt the real-life Charles Cholmondeley would have approved of his portrayal. I also can’t quite shake the feeling that the subplot was added to beef up the runtime, which it does, considerably. Alas, when we reach the end of the movie, nobody in this love triangle ends up with anyone else in it. Colin Firth’s Ewen Montague was closest to the finish line and the clear favourite to win. A very British triangle, you could say. This is mainly because the two male leads portray not characters but historical figures and for the written summary that ends the movie, they have to tell the truth and this is where the lives of these two men trump the indulgences of the script writers. It makes for an underwhelming experience when one of the main pillars of the movie was a setup to nothing.

There is also suspicions between the love triangle characters with some suspecting others of being double agents for foreign powers like Russia. This also amounts to not very much other than one tense scene.

So our heroes have to find a corpse, dress it up as a Major and fabricate official documents. The getting of the corpse was, surprisingly for wartime, more difficult to than you’d think. The body of a vagrant named Glyndwr Michael was used, little would the living man know how his body was used to serve his country and save countless Allied lives. The film does have several funny moments where they try to get a passport photo of the corpse and his face needs to look “life-like” – suffice to say they resorted to lookalikes. They rename the body, dress him up in official military clothes and discretely transport him to the European Continent, Huelva, Spain.

I guess we will need to talk about Ian Flemming, whose character in this plays a highly superfluous role, yet gets plenty of shoutouts one-the-less. These parts of the film involve addressing the audience directly, the film makers knowing that you know who he is and if you don’t, its explained that he’s a writer in his free time. The amount of time spent talking about Ian Flemming would imply he had something to do with the main story, but no. He’s just here for the fun “Bond” references. “M” and “Q” get mentioned.  There’s a buzzsaw watch which I highly doubt was ever really manufactured during World War 2.

The acting is great, everyone brings their A-game. The story moves at a fair pace and commendable efforts are made to add tension to a story that otherwise is people talking in different conference rooms. Some of it lands, some of it not so much. I would say that Operation Mincemeat is a WW2 tale that would make a better documentary than a feature-length film. It does not have the rewatchability of say, Saving Private Ryan (though not much does)

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