Churchill's Secret
Churchill's Secret
| 29 February 2016 (USA)
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British Prime Minister Winston Churchill suffers from a stroke in the summer of 1953 that's kept a secret from the rest of the world.

Reviews
Protraph

Lack of good storyline.

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Dotsthavesp

I wanted to but couldn't!

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Claysaba

Excellent, Without a doubt!!

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Mathilde the Guild

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

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sekgraham

There is very little that is factual or worthwhile about this film. Churchill was not only a key architect of D-Day, he was central to its success. He was not the dithering, raving fool relegated to the sidelines of launching Operation Overlord as portrayed here.The story of an angst-ridden Churchill, hysterically raving against the Normandy invasion and being soundly chastised by Eisenhower and Montgomery, is pure fiction posing egregiously as "history". There is little to commend this film as it laboriously drags itself through one of the most momentous periods in true history. The characters do not reveal their true nature but are simple, badly drawn (and highly erroneous) caricatures, the story telling is pure torture and its irrelevance to a meaningful interpretation of history and the men who made it cannot be understated.I cannot help but find it offensive that this movie could ever have been made under the title of Churchill, as if this is the definitive interpretation of the man. It is a travesty, adding nothing of value to the volumes of historical analyses that have taken him as their subject.

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bkoganbing

Michael Gambon as Winston and Lindsay Duncan as Clementine Churchill lead a good cast in a good recreation of the 50s and the hidden crisis that the United Kingdom had at the time. If you can imagine a situation where Barack Obama suffered a stroke and Joe Biden was also incapacitated with bad jaundice then you have some idea of what Great Britain was going through. And the media stayed silent. After leading the Conservative Party to victory in 1951 Churchill two years later sustains a serious stroke and it's touch and go. Anthony Eden as Foreign Secretary was considered the heir apparent, in fact he had even expected to lead the party in 1951, but patiently put his ambitions on a backburner.Alex Jennings plays an increasingly impatient Anthony Eden who felt that Churchill had just stayed on and Eden was ambitious to have his turn at the top of the greasy pole. What you're seeing here concerning them is true enough. What is not shown is that when the torch passed Eden got himself and the country in a royal mess over the Suez Canal and his government barely lasted two years.My favorite is Michael Macfayden as Randolph Churchill. Winston's only son was the belligerent drunken lout you see here. But like his three surviving sisters could never come out from so great a shadow. Oddly enough Winston's relationship with his father Randolph was somewhat the same.The only equivalents I can see in our history was when Grover Cleveland had that cancer operation one of the very first performed in his second term and no one knew until 20 years later. Also Churchill's counterpart FDR spent an entire month during World War II almost in seclusion at Bernard Baruch's estate in South Carolina and the public never knew at the time. Roosevelt was in almost terminal exhaustion from war leadership and he would die within two years of that.Churchill's Secret is good history for the viewer.

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Tim Dean

I cannot understand how few reviewers here are complimentary. Michael Gambon delivers a magnificent performance, true to what we know of Churchill's personality and complex nature. It doesn't matter to me that the actor doesn't look very much like the great man - he PRESENTS a great man in a health crisis to perfection. LIndsay Duncan is 'Clemmie' exactly as I remember her from the public image of the time. The way her hair is done is exquisitely correct. I was eleven and I remember the drama of Churchill's illness from the newspapers. I remember, as a boy, noting that Churchill's personal doctor was a certain Lord Moran who came and went initially at the famous front door of Number 10. We all knew that Chartwell was the Churchill country seat (not his 'ancestral home' which, as we know, was Blenheim Palace where he was born.) It was wonderful that the filming took place at Chartwell. We also knew that Churchill's children were difficult, particularly the boorish Randolph, and that Sir Winston was probably to blame for having neglected them through his undoubted self-absorption. Romola Garai, as always, creates a memorable personality with her entirely believable ace nurse. The casting is superb, the settings perfect and the art direction highly sensitive. And the cars! How I loved the shiny cars of my childhood. There's a pristine, bulbous Austin that I remember admiring as a boy. Delicious visual details are abundant in the film. There were many moments when I was surprised by my own tears, notably when Lady Churchill, having warmed sufficiently to the newly-met young nurse, poured out the story of the child she and Winston had lost; to this wise, down-to-earth, delightful young woman.These were probably the last days of the "right to rule" self-image of the Tory Party. For England's powerful middle classes it was still normal to think of a Labour Government as a temporary aberration. The moment I saw the book that Winston inscribed to his nurse I recalled that not even the first volume of "A History of the English-Speaking Peoples" had yet been published. But it didn't matter in the slightest. It was not a gaffe. It was an inspired and moving moment in the plan of this outstanding film. The acting skills on display in 'Churchill's Secret' are - I submit - breathtaking. Why do we take for granted the artistry of our wonderful British actors? We need to show them our love with the compliments they deserve.

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benbrae76

I looked forward to this production with anticipation of something great, particularly with the wealth of acting talent on hand. But oh dear! What a disappointment!Michael Gambon/Churchill took to his bed and seemed to want to stay there and forget about the whole thing. The rest of the cast looked equally bored and I'm not surprised. Even their combined talent couldn't rescue this tedious and utterly pointless badly-constructed and ill-scripted piece of alleged 'factual' drama in which one of the central characters...the nurse...was actually fictitious. As for the plot...what plot? There's very little plot in it to discuss.No doubt there will be those who will drool over it and call it 'art', but it's already gone to the back-burner of my mind as easily forgettable, and never to be watched again.In short it was a waste of time and effort for both cast and viewer.

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