Munich: The Edge of War. (12A.)
Directed by Christian Schwochow
Starring George MacKay, Jannis Niewöhner, Jeremy Irons, Jessica Brown Findlay, Robert Bathurst, Sandra Hubber and August Diehl. In cinemas, Streaming on Netflix from Friday. 124 mins.
After the hundreds of films about Churchill, here is a film about his predecessor, Neville "peace for our time” Chamberlain. It’s a largely sympathetic portrayal of a prime minister often condemned as a gutless appeaser but even in his own film he has to play second fiddle to a made-up espionage tale about two old chums from Oxford, MacKay and Niewöhner, who are now working for the opposing diplomatic services. Appropriately, for a film about Chamberlain it’s all about having in your hand a piece of paper; in this case a classified German Foreign office document about Hitler’s true ambitions.
Edge of War starts with a clever piece of misdirection: scenes of Londoners desperately preparing for War, hoisting up barrage balloons and trying out their gas masks. The time though is not 1939 but the year before when the British are trying to prevent Hitler invading Czechoslovakia over his claim for the Sudetenland. Adapted from the Robert Harris novel, the action is centred around the Munich conference in which Chamberlain will return as a hero with his piece of paper and his peace for our time.
It's a well-mounted production and Irons' interpretation of Chamberlain is nuanced. Though the end credits ascribe a secret honour to Chamberlain’s appeasement the narrative isn’t so clear cut. The problem is that all the espionage shenanigans between Mackay and Niewöhner are largely just time fillers. We all know how it will turn out and the production struggles to manoeuvre around its own pointlessness: Mackay and Niewöhner seem to be risking their lives for a plan whose success or failure will be historically irrelevant. It may have taken a major character (laughing Nazi Diehl) from Inglorious Basterds but not its bold ending.
Directed by Christian Schwochow
Starring George MacKay, Jannis Niewöhner, Jeremy Irons, Jessica Brown Findlay, Robert Bathurst, Sandra Hubber and August Diehl. In cinemas, Streaming on Netflix from Friday. 124 mins.
After the hundreds of films about Churchill, here is a film about his predecessor, Neville "peace for our time” Chamberlain. It’s a largely sympathetic portrayal of a prime minister often condemned as a gutless appeaser but even in his own film he has to play second fiddle to a made-up espionage tale about two old chums from Oxford, MacKay and Niewöhner, who are now working for the opposing diplomatic services. Appropriately, for a film about Chamberlain it’s all about having in your hand a piece of paper; in this case a classified German Foreign office document about Hitler’s true ambitions.
Edge of War starts with a clever piece of misdirection: scenes of Londoners desperately preparing for War, hoisting up barrage balloons and trying out their gas masks. The time though is not 1939 but the year before when the British are trying to prevent Hitler invading Czechoslovakia over his claim for the Sudetenland. Adapted from the Robert Harris novel, the action is centred around the Munich conference in which Chamberlain will return as a hero with his piece of paper and his peace for our time.
It's a well-mounted production and Irons' interpretation of Chamberlain is nuanced. Though the end credits ascribe a secret honour to Chamberlain’s appeasement the narrative isn’t so clear cut. The problem is that all the espionage shenanigans between Mackay and Niewöhner are largely just time fillers. We all know how it will turn out and the production struggles to manoeuvre around its own pointlessness: Mackay and Niewöhner seem to be risking their lives for a plan whose success or failure will be historically irrelevant. It may have taken a major character (laughing Nazi Diehl) from Inglorious Basterds but not its bold ending.
