Day 5 - 147 -- Watching History

Less housework happened today, which left time for some of the office work and another movie. I had several recorded for the day I felt time for viewing. Today was the day. I chose 'Dunkirk' a movie about the evacuation of British and Allied troops from the beaches of Dunkirk in France during WWII. Interestingly, I realized partway through the movie that this weekend was the beginning of Operation Dynamo 78 years ago. The German forces had trapped the Allied troops in Dunkirk. The only way out was a retreat by water. The operation involved many small boats that were able to take men from the beaches to the larger ships. Over 300 of these fishing boats, pleasure craft and other working vessels crossed the Channel and ferried evacuees over nine days. Final figures showed that over 330,000 troops were evacuated. Many private craft and naval vessels were sunk by U-boats and air strikes. Allied air forces ran interference during the operation. When the evacuation of French troops ended on June 4, Churchill gave his famous "We shall fight on the beaches . . ." speech. This happened just over 3 weeks after he became Prime Minister when Neville Chamberlain resigned for health reasons.

The movie with Christopher Nolan at the helm, provided a unique perspective of the Operation, showing things from the viewpoint of the Army troops on the beaches and during transport, the fighter pilots in the air, and the small boat operators. The Army and Navy leaders were shown, but the focus was clearly on the other players. Few names were provided. Given there were hundreds of thousands of men on the beaches, names would be less known. Two young soldiers are involved in the story line from the outset. One squadron of fighter planes was followed and one operator of a small boat was highlighted. Each was shown in their own time line, only converging near the end. This worked better than a documentary-style linear timeline as is often seen in battle movies. The confusion of the battle events seemed more real likely due to this presentation choice. The 9 day procedure (May 26-June 4) seemed a bit compressed into a single day or two, though this was likely for the sake of the movie time limits. It has a PG rating and less blood than seen in many battle films. I would recommend this for viewing. It is well worth time to understand perspectives of  history.

One song came to mind while thinking through the blog for today. It is a song that Dad and I would play -- me on the piano and him with the saxophone. We generally played it at a slower tempo than most recordings -- just the way I tended to hear it in my head. <smile>  Enjoy!

Coming in on a Wing and a  Prayer -- Anne Shelton