The Imitation Game review: A moral enigma

As one of the most uncomfortable moments in recent British history, the life of Alan Turing has long proved a difficult topic for filmmakers. A brilliant Cambridge-educated mathematician, Turing is credited with dramatically shortening the length of the Second World War by deciphering the Enigma Code, the apparently unbreakable cipher used by the Germans to send vial military messages. However, Turing led a tragic post-war life, eventually driven to suicide by his prosecution for homosexuality by a police force ignorant of the achievements he was forced to keep secret. This new adaption may lack historical accuracy and is at times morally questionable, but it's a superbly watchable portrait of the life of one of the most remarkable and abused minds of the 20th century.  

Benedict Cumberbatch's portrayal of Turning is the driving force of The Imitation Game; there's a sense that not only is he the best actor for the role, but the only actor for it. An utterly narcissistic sociopath, Turing in many ways harks back to Cumberbatch's Sherlock; cocky, cold and calculated but prone to brief moments of warmth and tenderness. A thrilling script allows for moments of sharp comedy between Turing and his commander, Alastair Denniston (Charles Dance), with the mathematician painted as a fish out of water from his very first scenes on a train packed with evacuee children. Fortunately, a crisp approach to the film's chronology involving regular switching between Turing pre, post and during the war helps expose more of his character and prevents him from becoming the stock socially outcast genius, and Kiera Knightley's fellow codebreaker Joan Clarke plays her part in this too. The closeness between the two reveals previously unseen aspects of Turning's character, but Clarke isn't just a tool to further Cumberbatch's performance; Knightley plays her to brazenly funny perfection. Disappointingly the same can't be said for the rest of Turning's colleagues, who come off as dull cutouts, but in the end this is a film about the man himself and the performance behind him. 

However, a desire to enhance the dramatic effect of the quest to break Enigma has led to historical inaccuracies which rather undercut the film's various successes. One noticeable issue is Commander Denniston's unfair presentation as a bureaucratic monster, which seems an exceptionally desperate attempt at creating a villain (Hitler and the Nazis are seen only through occasional images of war-torn battlefields and newsreels). It may be pedantic, but the inaccuracies genuinely lessen the authenticity of the movie as a whole. Worse still is the puzzling lack of focus on Turing's homosexual feelings and relationships, with director Morten Tyldum preferring to devote screen time to the relationship between Turing and Clarke. While this could be argued as reflective of the exceptionally private nature of Turing's life, it's an overly safe move that makes Turing's eventual acknowledgement of his sexuality seem confusing and rather out of character. Tyldum makes another bizarre moral decision in the film's parting moments, his celebration of Turing's Royal Pardon contrasted with only small mention of the 49000 unpardoned gay men convicted of the same offence.

For all its moral moral issues, The Imitation Game is a brilliantly made film, a cautious pace building to giddy heights with the euphoria of the final defeat of Enigma. It's an impressively thrilling, funny and even moving film held together by a sublime performance from Benedict Cumberbatch. 

7/10