Alan Ritchson, Henry Cavill
“THE MINISTRY OF UNGENTLEMANLY WARFARE” My rating: C (Netflix)
202 minutes | MPAA rating: R
It’s hard to sympathize with Nazis — but that was before Guy Ritchie’s “The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare.”
In this stiff-upper-lip variation on “The Dirty Dozen” a crew of British military prisoners — members of the armed services who have been condemned for their bloodthirsty ways — are sent out to sabotage a ship carrying vital supplies for Hitler’s U-Boat fleet.
Apparently the film has some basis in fact. We’re told newly declassified documents have revealed that during WWII Winston Churchill authorized a clandestine group of killers. The unit’s methodology was so appallingly brutal that their activities were kept a secret from the British public. In fact, only a few highly-placed military men knew of it.
Ritchie’s retelling (the script is by Paul Tammy, Eric Johnson and Arash Amel) offers seemingly endless action scenes seasoned with big dose of black humor and a nihilist sensibility.
Not to mention the torn corpses of countless Germans unlucky enough to encounter our heroes, who positively relish the mayhem.
Leading the band of merry murderers is Gus March-Phillips (Henry Cavill with luxurious beard) and a towering Swede (Alan Ritchson) who enjoys thinking up the most painful and personal ways to dispatch Germans. Alex Pettyfer, Hero Fiennes Tiffin and Henry Golding round out the crew. Taken as a whole, they look like carousing male models.
Much of the film unfolds on the high seas as our guys pose as fishermen in an effort to sneak up on their target.
Meanwhile they have help from a couple of spies (Eliza Gonzalez and Babe Olusanmokun) who have infliltrated a German-occupied seaport on the West African coast. There they get things ready for our guys and deal with a sadistic (is there any other kind in the movies?) German officer (Til Schweiger).
We also have Rory Kinnear as Churchill (a usually reliable actor who here didn’t convince me for a minute), Freddie Fox as Ian Fleming (yes, the creator of James Bond) and Cary Elwes as Brigadier Gubbins, the model for the Bond series’ “M.”
Viewers looking for a big fix of bloody action will get that and more. Violence usually doesn’t bother me, but the murderous glee on display here really rubbed me the wrong way.
Bob Odenkirk
“NORMAL” My rating: C+ (HBO Max)
91 minutes | MPAA rating: R
The transformation of funny guy Bob Odenkirk into a full-fledged action star (“Nobody,” “Nobody 2”) continues with “Normal,” the latest from Brit auteur Ben Wheatley (“Kill List,” “A Field In England”).
The setting is Normal, a Midwestern farm burg in the dead of winter. Odenkirk plays Ulysses Richardson, a law enforcement floater who has been temporarily assigned to take over the sheriff’s department after the mysterious death of the old sheriff.
Ulysses is an underachiever waiting to reach retirement age. Turns out he picked the wrong town in which to lay low.
The script by Derek Kolstad and Odenkirk kicks into gear with an attempted robbery of the local bank. That act triggers an eruption of murder, culminating with the town being invaded by an army of Japanese Yakuza.
In a sort of perverse variation on “High Noon” Ulysses finds he cannot rely on this fellow citizens for help…not because they’re cowards but because they’re all working for the bad guys.
“Normal” features a couple of sneaky guest appearances (Henry Winkler, Lena Headey) and a whole lot of spectacularly staged violence. The tone is tongue-in-cheek, plenty of action but not the kind to leave a bad taste in your mouth.
| Robert W. Butler
