For the duration of my entire systematically educated life (excluding college), I was always taught about the Great Wars. WWI & WWII are the most documented wars in history, and the opportunity to put it in film will never pass by. There are so many stories that surround the war (recently, Fury & Monuments Men) that a lot of people didn’t know about, which had their significant impacts on the outcome of it, but this story is the one that truly has the most significance in World War 2, and it’s not what you would have expected. The fact that the outcome of one of the most violent Wars in history came down to a few mathematicians is something that’s pretty astounding.

This movie was one that had a lot of buzz because of the performance of Benedict Cumberbatch. He’s been regarded as one of the actors that has the potential to have a long and successful career. He certainly proved to me (not that he had to) that he can have a prosperous career, because this wasn’t exactly an easy role to take on. The role of Alan Turing is a fascinating one, because when it comes to people who are incredibly smart, there’s often a hidden secret behind them that makes them outcast from others. He clearly had a mental illness, but what he did was channel it to engineering (with a team of people), the greatest problem solver in modern-day history that propelled our current information age (crazy right?). You have to give some (some) credit to the Germans for developing such a jigsaw puzzle, in Enigma, that they used to their advantage in the war. They saw the best way to beat their opponent was to outsmart them, and that’s the great mystery as to how the war was won behind the scenes. Yes, the battle trenches and the soldiers still have to fight, but strategically, there has to be brains behind the brawn. That’s the beauty of the ‘game’ that was presented and played throughout the movie.

What’s not to be left out is the supporting cast. Mark Strong, Keira Knightley, and Matthew Goode showed up and played their parts well. It’s a smart and intriguing movie that doesn’t heavily focus on the war itself, and these are the kind of movies that are good to counterbalance the traditional movies that depict this event. There are a lot of things you can say about Cumberbatch’s performance, and I can only come up with one – great. Alan Turing is a great man that a lot of people didn’t know about, because this mission was top secret. However, this is a great story that should be told along with the things they teach about the war, in elementary & secondary schools. You don’t have to be a soldier to affect change in a great struggle for democracy’s sake, because if you have a gift, you can use it to your ability to be an enforcer of some sort. It’s always the hidden details that happen to be the most interesting, and the poetic flow that it has between love stories as well, was moving. Especially in the way society has moved today, mental health and sensitivity towards sexual preference were some focal points that I didn’t anticipate either. Great movie overall; check it out when you get a chance. But for now, this is my opinion, this is my review

That’s My Word & It STiXX