I must admit, The Imitation Game wasn’t something I would have picked to watch for some Saturday night entertainment. It was my partner (who has seen the biopic many times and keeps going back) who encouraged me to watch it ahead of our trip to Bletchley Park, where the legendary mathematician Alan Turing and his team of codebreakers deciphered the German Enigma code during World War II.
My initial reluctance to watch The Imitation Game was mainly because I have never enjoyed the subject of maths, a silly reason I know. However, the enthralling thriller completely overturned every expectation I had and I’m so glad I got to witness this powerful piece of cinema that’s available to watch on Prime Video.
Benedict Cumberbatch effortlessly transforms into the enigmatic Turing as he shares the screen with Keira Knightley, who breathes life into war heroine Joan Clarke, the only woman that worked alongside Turing and his team to save countless lives and shorten the Second World War by two years.
Although Turing tragically died at the hands of post-war society, The Imitation Game treats the mathematical genius with immense kindness as it celebrates his extraordinary achievements that changed the course of history for the better. Laced with nail-biting tension and heartbreaking emotion, this true story will have you hooked from start to finish.
Cracking the code
The Imitation Game received universal acclaim and won numerous awards when it was released 2014, with Cumberbatch and Knightley both being nominated for Best Actor and Best Supporting Actress at the Academy Awards. Unsurprisingly, it has a superb 90% Rotten Tomatoes score, so it rightfully earns a place on our best Prime Video movies list.
Amongst the likes of Cumberbatch’s other biopics such as The Electrical Life of Louis Wain and The Courier, The Imitation Game proves that he is a trailblazer in his ability to portray historical figures. The Rolling Stone agrees, writing in its review: “The film’s prime force is Cumberbatch, a great actor whose talent shines here on its highest beams. It’s an explosive, emotionally complex performance. An early scene in which Turing, 27, interviews for a job at Bletchley with Commander Dennison (Charles Dance, doing smug to a turn) is wonderfully comic as Turing gains the upper hand.”
We can’t forget about Knightley, however, as she’s also a force to be reckoned with as the whip-smart mathematician Joan Clarke, with Mark Kermode saying in The Guardian: “As for Knightley, while her role may tend somewhat toward brainy posh-girl caricature (the exclamation ‘Oh!’ becomes ‘Ay-o!’), she manages to breathe warmth and humanity into the character of Joan, a likable foil to the impenetrable Turing, her affectionate gaze mediating our response to his perpetually unbreakable enigma.”
With a top-tier cast that brings history to life, The Imitation Game is a stellar example of a memorable biopic.
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