These days, films about India whipping the Pakistani army or intelligence is considered jingoism, but decades after World War II, Germans are still being mowed down by British soldiers, going “Ha Ha” as if they were not human.
“Try to have fun,” Henry Cavill playing the real-life Gus March-Phillips tells his band of swaggering men, when they attack a German outpost to rescue a team member Geoffrey Appleyard (Alex Pettyfer), so that he can join their top secret mission to save the Allied side, by disabling deadly German U Boats.
A glum Winston Churchill (Rory Kinnear) is worried that Hitler is winning the war. His military advisors suggest peace negotiations; but the then PM chooses to go with the plan of M (Cary Elwes) and his aide Ian Fleming (the very same!), a very young officer played by Freddie Fox, to send in a bunch of rogue operators, who, if caught could be tortured and killed by the Germans, but give the British plausible deniability. Thus Operation Postmaster was hatched and the seed for a fictional James Bond was sown.
March-Phillips is sprung from prison, to head this covert mission to the West African port of Fernando Po, where the German U Boats refuel and replenish supplies from the Italian ship, Duchessa. Gus chooses his own team, comprising the Swedish archer Anders Lassen (Alan Ritchson), Freddy Alvarez (Henry Golding), Henry Hayes (Hero Fiennes Tiffin) and Appleyard, and a fishing boat called Maid of Honour to fool German warships. On ground at the port are undercover agent Heron (Babs Olusanmokun), who runs a casino bar, and Marjorie Stewart (Eiza Gonzalez), whose sole purpose is to bewitch the nasty Nazi Heinrich Luhr (Til Schweiger), who commands the port.
The film, directed and co-written by Guy Ritchie, is based on Damien Lewis’s 2014 historical novel, which in turn was based on declassified files from the British War Department; reality, however, could not have been so cartoonish. The Germans are outsmarted and outgunned in every scene, almost falling down dead quickly because they are supposed to. The British military establishment that disapproves of this style of vigilante warfare, is painted as dour and fuddy-duddy.
Operation Postmaster was undoubtedly a vital mission, and enabled America to join up with the Allies, when their ships could cross the Atlantic without the risk of being torpedoed. Unfortunately, Ritchie’s treatment of it is too jokey. The film (on Amazon Prime Video) is fast-paced and entertaining, but also disconcertingly shallow—more in the style of a heist caper than a military operation. The characters communicate in quips, snicker at danger, and are virtually indestructible like Marvel’s superheroes, without the capes.
Marjorie Stewart became an actress and married Gus March-Phillips, who was killed on another mission soon after, but he became the inspiration for James Bond created by Ian Fleming, who has a boss called M. The irregular tactics used by this mission laid the foundation for modern day black ops.
Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare
Directed by Guy Ritchie
Cast: Henry Cavill, Alan Ritchson, Alex Pettyfer and others
On Amazon Prime Video
