No. 6. (2021) A CALL TO SPY January 17th.

 

Film No 6 (2021)  January 17th.  1:20 PM  LUNA PALACE Windsor,  Nedlands .

"This will be a rudimentary operation. Women will be more inconspicuous. And make sure they are pretty." (Buckmaster issues his decision to Vera, her initiative to recruit women to the SOE meets his approval).  

A Call to Spy is a wonderful tribute film. A tribute to a few pioneering women who took incredible risks as SOE (Special Operations Executive)operatives, foot soldiers making a difference in the WWII effort to short circuit the Nazi push to rule Europe. 

But as for the film being a gritty account depicting the reality of how women were first recruited into undercover work under the most dangerous of war-time conditions, then A Call To Spy is more of a "girls own" tale than a Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy feature. The sequences of Virginia's 35 day trek over the snow encrusted Pyrenees mountains, protected from the elements by just a blanket over her shoulders was just one example of believability pushed to its limits.  

The film is slick and handsome. The tale, most importantly, recognizes real life heroes Virginia Hall (Sarah Megan Thomas), Noor Inayat Khan (Radhika Apte) and Vera Atkins (Stana Katic); the women called into service as part of Churchill's newly formed SOE unit. These women set a path for others to follow. The intelligence they extracted from war-torn Europe prior to D-Day helped to change the course of WWII. Khan, slight of figure, lugged a heavy wireless set around France, behind enemy lines. I found myself Googling her exploits immediately after the titles rolled. Both Hall and Khan have books written as tributes to their bravery.

Films like A Call To Spy are perfect matinee escape dramas. The screenplay is by Sarah Megan Thomas and Lydia Dean Pilcher directs. Pilcher completed Radium Girls (2018), (also based on true events) in the same style. These stories giving credit to women for their fortitude during dangerous chapters in history are important and they make for entertaining cinema. 8GUMS.