Impressed by the quality of the film apart from it being slightly out of synch with regards audio and video tracks. This might have been the cinema’s fault.
At Cineworld Stevenage it was very out of synch and very nearly ruined it. It was however an interesting experience seeing it on a big screen. There were many moments of brilliance and Redgrave’s performance as Wallis I think will probably never be bettered as was Richard Todd’s portryal of Gibson. The flying shots were for the most part realistic as they used real Lancasters but the shots through the bomb aimers window often looked strained and jerky. The film makers were encoumbered by the weapon still being classified secret so any new film will have the opportunity to show it in much more detail and perhaps also cover the activities inside the aircraft prior to the bomb run to get the thing spinning up to speed.
One thing that stood out was the fim makers efforts to try to keep the audiance understanding which character was speaking in the flying shots by having each crew member remove their oxygen mask after speaking so that his face remained visible. Although it worked to an extent I found it became a bit tirsome to watch!
Minor gripes (yes I saw the Lincoln and lots of post war roundels all over the place – was the ‘transport’ an Anson?) but all in all a truly great piece of British cinema.
In conclusion, watching it last night left me with the opinion that a re-make, in the right hands of course, could be a very good thing as the brave chaps who carried out the raid back in 1943 now really deserve a more technologically up to date vehicle for telling their amazing story. If, somehow, convincing actors and performances can be combined with cutting edge CGI then maybe we will get it.
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