Director Guy Ritchie has been on a media roll: “The Gentlemen”, Netflix and his latest bombastic extravaganza “The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare” both stylistically captivating; an exercise in camp, for the sole and unmitigated purpose of entertainment; success is served in spades in duo endeavors.
Loosely based on Operation Postmaster, Winston Churchill’s desperate design to cripple the Nazi war efforts, by sabotaging an Italian freighter carrying supplies to German U-boats, on the island of Fernando Po, Equatorial Guinea. Exercised with Olympian acuity by renegade warriors: Gus March-Phillips (Henry Cavill), Danish soldier Anders (Alan Ritchson), Freddy, explosive guru (Henry Golding), Irish sailor Tiffin (Hero Fiennes), Geoffrey, (Alex Pettyfer) rescued from a Nazi POW camp. By far the most flavorful character Marjorie Stewart depicted with lethal lusciousness by Eiza Gonzalez; with scintillating eroticism she seduces satanic Heinrich Luhr; the pivotal climax of the operation is interlaced with her rendition of “Mack the Knife”; worth every action-crammed, sinuous, melodic moment.
Ritchie lionizes these, beyond belief, mega men, fearless of life’s ephemerality, dauntless in vanquishing overwhelming obstacles, embracing levity, felling iniquity, the preeminent goal. Here is a film oozing in excessive chauvinism: exhaustively, engrossingly, entertaining.
FOUR STARS!!!!
Peneflix