Movie Review: Their Finest

Their Finest *** ½ / *****

Directed by: Lone Scherfig.

Written by: Gaby Chiappe based on the novel by Lissa Evans.

Starring: Gemma Arterton (Catrin Cole), Sam Claflin (Tom Buckley), Bill Nighy (Ambrose Hilliard), Jack Huston (Ellis Cole), Paul Ritter (Raymond Parfitt), Rachael Stirling (Phyl Moore), Richard E. Grant (Roger Swain), Henry Goodman (Gabriel Baker), Jake Lacy (Carl Lundbeck), Jeremy Irons (Secretary of War), Eddie Marsan (Sammy Smith), Helen McCrory (Sophie Smith).

 

Their Finest is the third movie about Dunkirk I have seen this year – following Christopher Nolan’s Dunkirk and Joe Walsh’s Darkest Hour – although, in fairness, it was made before either of those films, and likely on a much smaller budget. It’s a good addition to those two films – showing the British Homefront - and importantly women – during this time. The film wants to be an old fashioned romantic comedy, mixed with the drama of a war picture – and it’s not always an easy mixture of tones. But for the most part, the film is warm and funny and charming – and even if the romance doesn’t quite have the snap of the best screwball comedies from the time period it presents that it clearly wants to, it’s charming enough.

 

The film stars the always charming Gemma Arterton as Catrin Cole – a Welsh lass, in London with her “husband” – artist Ellis (Jack Huston) – who unlike most of the men his age, isn’t in the army, having been wounded in a previous battle. He makes no money, so she’s still working – getting a job at the Ministry of Information – and eventually, getting assigned to work on what amounts to a propaganda film about Dunkrik – to inspire the Homefront. The “true” story aspect of the movie they’re making is most bull – they know it, and don’t really care. Catrin has been hired to write “the slop” – meaning, the woman’s dialogue – since the film will be about two sisters, who steal their father’s boat to help with the evacuation at Dunkirk. Of course, she won’t be “paid the same as the lads” – but it’s not nothing. She finds herself teamed up with Tom Buckley (Sam Claflin) to write the film – and he’s obviously a better match for her than Ellis, and the two quickly fall into a quippy, flirtatious friendship.

 

There is a lot to like about Their Finest. It the film – directed by Lone Scherfig – making her best film since her debut, An Education, back in 2009 and written by Gaby Chiappe, based on a novel by Lissa Evans – and this trio of women certainly want to present the casual, deeply ingrained sexism of the film. They do this well, but don’t make the mistake many modern do, and try to have a revisionist view of history – Catrin stands up for herself, sure, but not in a way out of line for 1940. She wants more money – but doesn’t bat and eye when she’s told she won’t be paid as much as the men for example. Or the way Ellis immediately assumes she’ll come with him when his art exhibition goes on tour – abandoning her own career, even though it pays for everything.

 

It really is the performances that make the film truly work though – a no one is more of a joy to watch than Bill Nighy, playing an age ham of an actor – once famous for a Detective series, now slumming it in anything he can get. Nighy is a delight in every scene he’s in. Arterton is very good too as Catrin – she’s got a warm, open face that makes you immediately root for her. She doesn’t quite have the comedy chops I would have preferred – I was kind of hoping the workplace, flirty scenes would go full Katherine Hepburn/Cary Grant – but neither she nor Claflin are up to that. Instead, theirs is a warmer, more toned down relationship.

 

The movie hums along at a brisk pace, and is mainly a hell of lot of fun. Occasionally, the film introduces some darker moments along the way – and we prepare ourselves from the beginning for not everything to work out. This doesn’t always work – but it works enough of the time to make it work. Their Finest is a fine film – a comfortable, warm funny film that hits the right emotional notes. It never reaches greatness – but it is so consistently good, you don’t much mind.