Among the Holiday Season new releases is the fourth film by Norwegian director Morten Tyldum, The Imitation Game. It is based on the true story of British mathematician and cryptanalyst Alan Turing and his body of work inventing a countermeasure device to the German Enigma machine. This story appeals to the intellect, to crossword puzzle fans and in the end to everyone’s moral conscience. Acting the role of Turing is Benedict Cumberbatch who delivers a convincing performance of an isolated soul with an intriguing mind. After the first few scenes, especially the job interview with a Royal Navy commander at Bletchley Park where Turing seems to intentionally infuriate the interviewer, it made me wonder if a person so in his own head as he appeared was a socially immature imbecile crying for help or a true genius who played his prospective boss like a finely tuned concert instrument. A few scenes later the latter was apparent. Despite Turing’s well depicted track record of not playing well with others, he manages through messy confrontation to assemble and maintain enough of the right kind of like-skilled mathematicians and cryptanalysts to achieve the command mission. Turing’s invention of the Enigma countermeasure machine was a huge feat but his real genius was scientifically calculating how much of the deciphered information to use to ensure an Allied victory without revealing to the enemy their code had been broken. In doing this he truly was playing God.
Turing successfully hid his homosexual proclivity during his service at Bletchley Park although all those close to him seemed to intuitively know he was gay, even the young lady to whom he was briefly engaged. It was also quite apparent after his countermeasure invention actually did what it was supposed to do that Turing was an indispensable human asset therefore allowing his superiors all the way up to the Prime Minister to turn a blind eye to suspicions of indecency. He however does not get through the war without having to deal with the personal betrayal of the member of his assembled staff who was closest to him. Such is the societal disgrace of criminalizing character traits such as sexual orientation.
As I said, this film appeals to intellect, crossword fans and in the end to everyone’s moral conscience. It was ultimately a diligent police investigation years after the war that led to Alan Turing being charged with indecency in 1952, convicted and subsequently forced to undergo court ordered hormone therapy instead of serving a prison sentence. Turing committed suicide in 1954. It left me wondering how much sooner we could have had computer technology had he been left alone to further the work he started when he was the most critical human being serving the Allied cause. Prejudice and ignorance do exact a heavy price from us all.
I give this film four out of five stars. ****