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Movie Review: The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare

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The main problem with the new World War II movie “The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare” is that when you take a light and sometimes comic spin concerning stories about real soldiers and spies during the worst war in human history, at times, it can disrespect the people who risked their lives to defend their country. The TV show “Hogans Heros”, comes to mind – that tried during its run, to make life as a prisoner in a German prison camp seem comical. As the entire world knows, nothing is funny about any part of the Second World War.

The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare is directed by Guy Richie and is two hours that seems a lot like many of his other movies that have involved war, criminals, or spying. This movie has many well-known actors playing spies in the British Secret Service, including Henry Cavill as Gus March-Phillips, Alan Ritchson as Anders Lassen, Alex Pettyfer as Geoffrey Appleyard, Eiza González as Marjorie Stewart, Cary Elwes as Brigadier Gubbins ‘M’ and Hero Fiennes Tiffin as Henry Hayes.

This story follows two groups of British spies, one group is trying to infiltrate the German high-level military and the other group blows up German military installations and kills a great many German soldiers. The over-the-top killing scenes have more to do with Hollywood violence embellishment than trying to show what really happened during these missions. The actor Alan Ritcheson has the most outlandish and violent killing scenes that seem more like excerpts from one of the 4 “John Wick” films. When it comes to making any movie about World War II, it should always be accuracy first and insane action scenes to make an exciting movie trailer second.

From the relatively low 72% ratings on Rotten Tomatoes for this run of the mill war movie that we have all seen before, the opinions are mostly about “nothing new here” , rather than commenting on a great historical World War II story that most of the world has never heard of before. My rating is about 70% and a moderate pass, as this is more about John Wick type action and not about a significant story within the most important war in history.

      Movie Review: Civil War

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      One of the craziest parts about the new movie “Civil War” is how for an entire two hours, with a story about photo journalists covering a major Civil War in the United States – between the East and the West is that there is not one single second devoted to the most important issue – why is there a Civil War going on? What caused a war like this to happen? How long has it been going on? What does each side believe? Have there been attempts at peace? Amazingly, none of these most important issues were ever addressed during the entire movie.

      This entire story is about a series of scenes where 4 journalists, played by Kirsten Dunst,
      Cailee Spaeny, Stephen McKinley Henderson and Wagner Moura, survive near death experiences all to take pictures of an ongoing war while traveling 900 miles to Washington DC.

      There is a good deal of extreme violence in this film, in some cases too much unnecessary violence, all the while with no explanation why there was a war going on in the first place. This story also points out how ridiculous it is to have untrained people from the press within any war zone. They have no training, no guns and take huge risks with their lives only to take pictures. How many members of the press have died over the years covering wars, when their deaths were completely preventable, by a camera on the helmet of a soldier or a tank. The reporter David Bloom comes to mind from the Iraq War in 2003, who was a reporter who was killed because he was in a war zone, when he had no business being there.

      As far as this movie, due to the glaring hole in the screenplay, not explaining the reasons for the Civil War, I do not agree with the 84% rating, giving this movie a 70% and a very moderate recommendation.

      Movie Review: Farewell, Mr. Haffmann

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      In the history of movies, there has never been a more produced and written about subject than World War II. Some of these movies have been war movies, others about the Hallocaust and others stories like this one about the plight of so many ordinary people in the path of a huge world war, started by Nazi Germany in 1938.

      The story of the new French movie “Farewell, Mr. Haffmann” is about a Jewish jeweler in Paris France who is hidden in the basement of one of his employees and his wife when the Germans take over France. The hope is once the conflict subsides, he can escape France and be with his wife who is living in another country. The sub story has to do with the couple unable to have children, and then blackmailing the jeweler to get his wife pregnant. It is this part of the overall story that for me did not work and had no place in a story that was all about the persecution of the Jews during World War II, leading to the Hallocaust.

      Due to this strange screenplay idea, I was surprised at the 100% ratings on Rotten Tomatoes, about a mostly forgettable World War II story. The IMDB rating for this film is a much more correct 70%, with my rating also 70% and a moderate recommendation mostly for the acting and not for a mostly bad story.