The Clubhouse Podcast

iTunes Exclusive Episode The Imitation Game

December 4, 2016 Season 5, Episode 120

Rob, Don, and Dave review The Imitation Game, starring Benedict Cumberbatch as Alan Turing and Kira Knightley as Joan Clark. The film follows Turing's work breaking the German Enigma encryption machine during World War II, told across three different time periods in his life. The hosts praise the direction by Morten Tyldum, the performances across the cast, and the historical authenticity, though note some confusion navigating the film's multiple timelines.

About this episode

Key takeaways

  • Cumberbatch delivers an immersive performance that the hosts believe warrants an Oscar nomination
  • Kira Knightley elevates her game in this role, with one host initially mistaking her for Winona Ryder
  • The film jumps between three time periods—Turing's childhood, World War II, and the 1950s—which creates some narrative confusion
  • Supporting cast including Matthew Goode, Charles Dance, and Mark Strong deliver strong performances throughout
  • The film maintains historical authenticity in its sets, costumes, and use of actual World War II footage rather than recreations

Q&A

What is the Enigma machine in the film?

A German encryption machine used to send messages with codes that reset daily at midnight. It has 150 million million possible combinations, making it nearly impossible to break quickly.

What confused viewers about the film's structure?

The film cuts between three different time periods in Turing's life. While his childhood scenes are clearly marked, the distinction between the World War II era and the 1950s timeline becomes unclear without explicit time markers.

How did the hosts rate Cumberbatch's performance?

All three hosts praised it highly. One host predicted an Oscar nomination and called it a grand slam performance, while another highlighted his emotional breakdown at the end of the film.

What aspect of the film did the hosts find most effective visually?

The use of actual World War II footage and historically accurate sets and neighborhoods that captured the time period naturally without overemphasizing the era.

Read Transcript

The following is a sooner orgator production. Music Greening's Empire, Remember, and Or Members. If you are hearing my voice, we hope it means one of a couple of things.

Maybe you visited the Clubhouse podcast once in your life, and for that we are greatly appreciative. Your one-stop shop for all things sports and entertainment. Live every Sunday, night at 70's turn for Pacific, or maybe it means you subscribe on iTunes, which is one way you could be hearing my voice right now.

If that happens, we greatly appreciate it. Because it's time for another, all teams exclusive. Welcome.

My name is Rob. And I would think I'm a fairly simple man. I am the executive producer of The Three Ring Circus Known as the Clubhouse podcast, but I am not alone today.

Joining me to my left is the official fact checker of this show. And a man who's pretty good at puzzles, especially if you call him Sudoku. You may know him as Fondongo, but as my name is Don Ford, I'm going to call him Don Ford, welcome to the show, sir.

I'm addicted to those puzzles. But we got another one. If you tricks wife, we'll get into that one.

If you tricks wife, we got another one. That's not put the card before the horse here, sir. Well, my old people don't know, but we're not there yet.

I don't. Also joining me across the desk this evening, or the today. I don't know.

We don't want you to. We're cool with it. Is a man who is a riddle wrapped in an igma with a bubble of a mystery.

He is friend of the show, Dave Scott. Welcome to the show, sir. Hello, thank you.

Whatever we do, and I told you, it's true. It's usually to review something, and today is no exception. We are here to review a movie.

Brand new movie, but I probably, when this gets released, I'm sure, starring the great Benedict Cumberbatch, as well as Kira Knightley, is called the imitation game. We give you a quick rundown of this thing. Basically, Benedict Cumberbatch is based on the true story, but he's a guy by the name of Alan Turing, who is nothing short of a genius.

It's whole life, he's always excelled at things, and he is enlisted by the British government to construct a way to break something called the enigma, which is an encryption machine that the Germans use for messages that they send, and they reset the code every day and midnight, to keep the allies from breaking their codes. With this enigma machine, there are 150 million million possible combinations, so it's virtually impossible to get there quickly. So what Cumberbatch and his team are enlisted to do is find a way to break the codes of the allies that can win the war, and that's kind of where I'm going to leave it.

I don't want to go too much deeper into these synopsis of this film. We got to see it courtesy of our friends at Allied Integrated Marketing, some of our best friends in the world. Thank you for letting us see that film, our best friends, thank you so much, guys.

Directed by Morton Tildum, he is a foreign director from Norway, has done this is his first real probably big American film, but Don, let's start with you, what did you think of the story? I like the story, based on a true story, so I thought the plot was very good, I didn't think it really dried in any point, but it wasn't a rush big action film, that's it. It's kind of the reaction like a lot of stuff you see on the history channel, I thought, in some of those documentaries in some way, but a very good way.

Dave? I actually, I thought the story line was fantastic, it made me want to go on to the Internet and learn more about Alan Turing, and what you did, and what I did, and I did find a couple of facts had to be in a skew, but it seemed fairly close to accurate to the story line, so I really enjoyed it. I enjoyed the story line as well, I've always been intrigued by stories of people who have brilliant minds for things like this, and I know that the enigma has already played a role at least one other film, so we know this is a real thing, but to see how his brain worked, and it takes place in three different times in his life, and to see how it works out, where it made him decide how he's going to break the code and what he goes through, very, very well told story.

The vision of the film, from Tilda, is nothing short of spectacular, and he really captured all three periods, both the early 20s, the late 30s, and then the late 40s, early 50s. I thought he did a very, very good job, I was based on the book by Andrew Hodges and Graham Moore wrote the screenplay. Don, how did you feel about visually the film itself?

I'd like to look very historically corrected when you really looked at the film. I don't know if they filmed this in England, but it's based in England. If they did film in England, they probably used these old neighborhoods that happened changed in about the last 50 years, so it really had that historical correctness look.

Now, in the early 20s, basically it's only on one real set, it's probably an old historical place also where they taped from, but everything I thought looked historically correct at the time, technology, car-wise, everything. Dave? I like to, I loved the way it was all set, and the time, I mean, it's obviously a time piece buried, and the sets were very simplistic.

I mean, it's very, the military, if you've ever been on a military base, you know, it's very basic, very straightforward, and a lot of that, you've got to see a lot of that, especially from the World War II era. Now, as far as the air, as far as what you said, being in Britain, I don't know that much about Britain to know that those were the exact areas, or it just seemed like a very well-done set. So, I've been in Britain once, and into the London, and in some of the outlying areas, and it looked like Britain, you know, in some of those old neighborhoods.

Of course, you've got new London downtown, which is nothing, but in the old Britain, yes, I thought it looked pretty correct. I did think it was interesting that they used old World War II footage versus recreating it and themselves. What I really, really dug about it is it captured the feel of the time without overchasing it.

Like, it was just, it just happened, it was almost like it just happened to take place in that time. It wasn't like, ooh, look, we're in the forties, you know. It was very, it was very natural, it was very organic, where you just felt like you were just watching it.

It wasn't like they didn't go out of their way to let you know what time frame they're in, which works, and then there's also a double sided at two, because as I said earlier, there are three different time frames in this film, and it took, I was a little disoriented between the latter two. Like when he was a kid, we knew it was him as a kid, but the World War II time and then the time after, which was supposed to be the 50s. Right.

That got a little confusing for me, because I didn't realize we were in two different time frames until much later in the film. It really probably would have been nice if they put like this many years after, like I mean, the war ended in what, in 44, when he died, I want to say it was either 54 or 59 that he died, because I looked all this up on the internet, obviously, and they don't say exactly how far after the war that he, I think it's like, it said in the world. I thought it said in the film that it was one year after the, the sensing, the ending of it takes, talks about one year later, but we don't, it's never truly clear exactly when after it happened.

But yeah, that got a little confusing for me, because I was kind of like hold on, and then I realized about two thirds of the way, okay, there's two different things going on here. I kind of felt like there were two things going at the same time where they really weren't. Yeah, they'd get to do a lot of flashback and make out a little bit confusing.

Yeah, go back to day's point. I loved the whole old historical film also that the show, because it made you get in that feel of the time, it made you think back, okay, we're now during World War II and all this stuff. He passed him 54.

Yeah, 54. Yeah, 54. He took, he, he, he was arrested as a homosexual on 52, and that does play a role in the film as well.

Yeah. And then it said in the thing that a year into the therapy, the heat, right? Right, right.

Right, right. We just, we were just trying to distinguish two time frames, which then leads us into the performances themselves, Benedict Cumberbatch is an acting. He's a walking, talking, breathing, acting clinic.

I mean, he just, he, he immerses himself, no matter what the role is that he takes. You know what you're getting with Cumberbatch. I mean, the Hobbit Star Trek into darkness.

He is Sherlock on the British series, Sherlock, you know, the guys just, he is absolutely, you know, August, Osage County, I mean, my god, yeah, film. So I already had a high bar set for him going into this. He did not disappoint me in any way, shape or form.

Also, in this film, starting with him, it came in nightly. I know that you're a huge, you are like, sergeant at arms of the Kira Knightley fan. Yes, I am.

She just doesn't do much for me as an actor. In this, I felt like she upped her game because she was told a toe with Cumberbatch, playing a Joan Clark, the young lady that ends up getting enlisted into this program that he's working on. I thought she was very, very strong in this as well.

Oh, I'll give that. I mean, I, I do not give a, yes, she's my future ex-wife, but I do not give her any extra cred, just because it's her. Remember, like, he's, she got, I'm trying not to, but yes, I do.

Okay, you might make a certain list of mine, but on this one, I agree that, you know, Kira Knightley did incredible because once she is British to fit the time and all that stuff, so she fit the role really good. Cumberbatch, I know you're saying you expect that bar and you know what you get, but in this one, even though he might hit a home run a lot in baseball, he hit a grand slam three times in one game on this one, I thought, Dave, I couldn't agree with you more. Cumberbatch was fantastic and I said, and he did the, you saw his acting really come out when he broke down at the end of the movie.

It was just, you, you got pulled into that and it was fantastic. Now, as far as Kira Knightley is concerned, I got told after the movie that was Kira Knightley because I, first off, I hated Lackie so badly, I didn't want to see anything with Kira Knightley in it. So, but I got told later on and after the film, after the film, because I was fooled, I actually thought, and I'm embarrassed to say this, that it was Winona Ryder, and I'm like, how did Winona Ryder get into this?

That's a fight in the word. But take that for what it is, it should be a compliment to that performance. Oh, yeah, totally.

But yeah, I can't say enough about Cumberbatch, and then he got some, also other great performers in this film also, Matthew Good, who you may remember him as Ozeyman, this in Watchman, plays a great role in this, where he plays Hugh Alexander, kind of the guy that originally heads the team, that turning ends up heading the team, a very interesting funny little sequence there in the film. But also Charles Dance, Papa Lannister from Game of Thrones, Mark Strong, who I'm a huge fan of, who will always be Sinestro to me. He plays their MI6 Cori, colleague, which was great, a lot of, I wouldn't say, yeah, I don't know that there was a weak performance in this thing.

I thought as a, as a cast in general, that they were all very, very, very good. A really canier as the detective, who in the later years of Turing's life, is investigating a break-in at Turing's house that turns up into something more, which ends up being the narrative of the film, very, very good performances by everybody involved in this day. I loved the performance of the game.

At least stand out for you. I was just looking up, I was trying to find out, do I remember seeing Ben Kingsley in this? No.

I remember. I mean, she knows everything. I feel like I'm in a tornado of Ben Kingsley recently, so I was just looking up just to make sure that I didn't, he was not this one, because I, yeah, I kind of feel like lately there's a website called Chut Out There, an early in Chut's career, whenever they'd review a film.

One of their questions was, is Paul G. Amadi in this film. I kind of feel like Ben Kingsley fits that category, right?

Yeah. I, I could be on record on saying this, Comber Batch, Oscar nomination. I agree with that.

I find, he's already up for at least this second ward, if not a golden glow. Yeah. I'm going to say that publicly right now, he will get an Oscar nomination for this.

It was that good. Do you still think it was better than nightcroller? Jill Hall, they're both incredible.

That's a very, very tough. If I, as a member of the academy who voted on best actor, I would give it to Jill Hall. A very, very tough decision, but I thought about that, because we talked about that the other night, I would give it to Jill Hall, but Comber Batch gets a very, very close second on my vote if I was a member of the academy.

They both deserve to be not going to be a tough year for the academy, talking to Steve Krell also possibly. There's going to be some, well, Steve Herald, Fox catcher. Okay.

Yeah, he's been nominated already for a second. It's a little bit. Yeah.

Wow. Yeah. It's going to be a humdinger of an Oscar season.

But I think Comber Batch, I will say it right now, he will get nominated. I'm not saying he's going to win, but he will get nominated. I just, I think that this was strong all the way around.

I mean, this is, I really can find anything bad about this movie. I've been very, very, very impressed with this film and a movie that I kind of felt I, I could have liked, but not loved. I absolutely loved this film.

It, it, it just, it held my attention. The story moved once I got kind of assimilated to what was going on and got everything sorted out. I enjoyed it that much more.

The, the little, going back in time, back in part, that's the only bad point I could see, but it's not really that huge of a thing. That's the only bad thing I could think about it when it comes down to it. Now how many world war movies have we seen this year?

I know, I know at least I am three. I'll talk to at least three, a fury for me. Okay.

I haven't seen fury. Oh, that's, yeah. That will make us certain less to mine this year, for sure.

Which will be getting into in the next couple of weeks. I'm not saying certain less spoiler, non-spon non-sporled. But I know there was, one that was terrible, the, the, then there was the, the railroad, one, what was that?

Oh, yeah. The, about the guy who goes back to the person, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That one was fantastic.

This one tops all of them in, in, wow, that's high praise, sir. All right, gentlemen, so we get to the final analysis, but we do, let's think our friends against it. I like, thank you so much.

So much. We love everything. Thank you for us.

With the way we do final analysis on this show, we don't just give you a grade, thumbs up, thumbs down, 1 to 10 stars. No, our empire, our audience is better than that. The way we do the final analysis on this show is it's a two-pron question.

Question number one is, would you see this film again, if the answer is no, then we're done here. But if the answer is yes, then it becomes, how much would you willing be willing to pay to see this film again, would you pay full price, would you go at a twilight, would you go at a mat name early morning, second run, red box, netflix, or would you just wait for it on cable? Dave will start with you.

Would you see this film again? Oh, definitely. Yeah, I would definitely go, I would actually pay to go see this movie again.

Uh, how far would you be willing to go to do that? Um, I would, I would see, uh, see, I'm cheap, so I will always go see a mat name. Okay.

I'll find a way around not spending the extra two or three dollars on it, so. So you see, you would say, I'd a mat name this evening again. Yeah, definitely.

I'd done, would you see this one again? Uh, definitely. All right, how far would you be willing to go?

Well, I'm going to do a three-pron, cause I like to do a three-pron too. Um, I hate to say it, but I probably only see this on HBO or as a rental, reason being there's so much coming out, what the Oscar season, but at the time everything that Elsa that I want to see will probably be, this will probably be out of theaters by that time, but I will recommend this as either a Twilight or full price at the theaters and it's that good. I would definitely see this film again.

Um, I would recommend it, maybe as, uh, Twilight, see it late in the afternoon, maybe catch dinner afterwards, uh, be prepared to be blown away. I mean, on every front by this, the direction, the look, the performances, everything in this film to me was strong. It's definitely a good date movie, and then, you know, after which you can spend all this time talking about it, I spent a lot of time looking it up online and I talked about it to my kids.

It was really interesting. Anything else? Uh, I recommend it, Highly.

All right. Let's get to the plugs. Visit our website, www.theclubhousepodcast.com, find out everything you need and some stuff you don't.

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Our normal show, your one-stop shop for all things sports entertainment is Sundays, seven Easter and four Pacific. Join us, won't you? We're just keep subscribing to iTunes, you get it, it was to where we want.

So until next time, for Don, for Dave, for the Empire, I'm Rob, the clubhouse is closed. Brittany Palmer, maybe working with the secretaries, I should probably be here agent with all these ideas I have. I'm just saying.

The preceding was a sooner or later production. Gotta go, gotta go! Why?

Because I have to. Go, royum!

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