Review of Their Finest (2017) by David B — 22 Apr 2017

BBC Film - Not Their Finest!

Disappointing given that the topic should be inspiring. It may have been satire from Lone Scherfig the Danish producer but never the less the effect is to dumb down the remarkable efforts of our soldiers. I am not a great fan of mixing humour with topics that were seismic in historical terms and also extraordinary in terms of the individual courage and trauma experienced by ordinary people that stepped up to the plate to give us our freedom today. Scherfig somehow manages to mock rather than pay credit to the heroism of our soldiers. Woman were extraordinary and worked so hard in the factories and fields to keep the war machine moving while the men were away. There's the usual token reference to lesbians that has its moments but is misplaced. As a Nation, there currently seems to be a desire to put ourselves down and media would even have us question the necessity for war. Their is an undercurrent of pacifism in this movie. The film industry fails to recognise that those times in the 1940s were very different. The film shows people sitting in cinemas scoffing at the Government propaganda. It also suggest that you could not believe anything that you were told at that time with the reference to the twins who did not make it to Dunkirk. The danger of this rhetoric is a dismantling of fact. This was an extraordinary achievement for our Nation in extraordinary times. The stories told through propaganda were vital at that time for moral. Shame on the producers for not recognising this. Through today's lense we could not possibly understand yesterday's events. Scherfig while celebrating woman could be said to mock the men as they are in most last depicted throughout the movie as bullies, arrogant, adulterers or alcoholics (I can hear some of you saying well...yes....that's because men are)! In my view, the film makes light of one of the most significant moments in British history. I told myself to sit it out and to give it every opportunity but it did not get any better. Come on BBC, must you put us down as a Nation ......it's time you celebrated greatness!