Overrated and overhyped

A Disappointing Continuation

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

Even when one has suffered such great loss,wouldn't that be giving death dominion over life?

Catrin Cole comes to London with her artist husband during the Blitz, and takes a job writing "slop" (dialogue for female characters) in films put out by the War Dept. This morphs into screenwriting an inspirational movie about the role of women in the Dunkirk evacuation. But personal relationships raise complications...This movie successfully weaves together elements of romance, drama, comedy, feminism, war, and the British class system (among others) in telling Mrs Cole's story. In doing so, it throws in two story twists, one of them major. They don't exactly turn the story on its head, but they do mean it doesn't follow the course one expects.Gemma Arterton is good as Mrs Cole, and Sam Claflin pleases as her boss. But everyone will love Bill Nighy as egotistical Actor Ambrose.I feared that this would be a feminist tract, but that particular message is sold subtly: it's there, but the film doesn't beat you over the head with it. And you are engaged by the characters, so the message is welcomed.I enjoyed this, and so did the rest of the audience, all of whom were over 60.

There have been countless movies about WWII. Most of them focus on the men in uniform, out in combat. Less gets shown of the women behind the scenes. Lone Scherfig's "Their Finest" focuses on a woman writing scripts for short information films in the United Kingdom. One of the things that I noticed is that it takes place around the time of the Dunkirk evacuation, recently depicted in Christopher Nolan's movie. That seems to be a popular topic these days, as is Winston Churchill (he's gotten depicted in several productions over the past year).It's not a masterpiece, but it pulls no punches in showing the horror of the air raids on London by Nazi forces, and the characters are developed enough so that the viewer cares about them. Gemma Arterton turns in a fine performance in the lead role, with good support from the rest of the cast (including Bill Nighy and Eddie Marsan).* I recommend the movie.*Incidentally, right after watching this I watched "The Limehouse Golem", in which those two also starred.

This reviewer "so" wanted to love this film. A light comedy about script writers writing and improvising on the fly while WWII crashes all around them, They are making a propaganda film and must keep the message positive despite what we all see. This experience mirrors the audience. The light or even sweet moments are fluff more than strikingly poignant, To be clear, our lead is adept at being sweetly (I said it again) stoic in the face of sexism, infidelity and in the midst of the blitz, but she hardly falters and seems almost unaffected. It may be the English way, bust as they said about Americans, we like our action, even in the script. Gemma Altertion is beautiful but is left to remind us about the woman' perspective in ways that make men seem incompetent. This could have been more of a light comedy to balance the war deaths, but the comedy is too lite, and the drama ineffective. The Germans were more on target then this film, full of potential, but eventually full of itself.