''War Book'' is a 2014 British

political Politics () is the set of activities that are associated with decision-making, making decisions in social group, groups, or other forms of power (social and political), power relations among individuals, such as the distribution of Social sta ...

drama film In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. The drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular ...

directed by Tom Harper and written by

Jack Thorne Jack Thorne FRSL (born 6 December 1978) is a British playwright, television writer, screenwriter, and producer. A massive fan of hard science fiction, he is best known for writing the stage play '' Harry Potter and the Cursed Child'', the fil ...

. The film features an

ensemble cast In a dramatic production, an ensemble cast is one that comprises many principal actors and performers who are typically assigned roughly equal amounts of screen time.Random House: ensemble acting Linked 2013-07-17 Structure In contrast to the po ...

, consisting of

Adeel Akhtar Adeel Akhtar is a British actor. He is known for his role in '' Murdered by My Father'', for which he won the British Academy Television Award for Best Actor in 2017. He is also known for ''Utopia'', '' Ali & Ava'', '' Showtrial'', and '' She ...

, Nicholas Burns,

Ben Chaplin Benedict John Greenwood (born 31 July 1969),''Births, Marriages & Deaths Index of England & Wales, 1916–2005.''; at ancestry.com better known as Ben Chaplin, is a British actor. He is best known for his roles in films, including '' Feast of Ju ...

Shaun Evans Shaun Evans (born 6 March 1980) is an English actor. He is best known for playing a young Endeavour Morse in the ITV drama series '' Endeavour'' and Coxswain Elliot Glover in ''Vigil''. Early life Evans was born on 6 March 1980. He is a Li ...

Kerry Fox Kerry Lauren Fox (born 30 July 1966) is a New Zealand actress. She came to prominence playing author Janet Frame in the movie '' An Angel at My Table'' directed by Jane Campion, which gained her a Best Actress Award from the New Zealand Film and ...

Phoebe Fox Phoebe Fox (born 16 April 1987) is an English actress, who was nominated for Olivier and Evening Standard awards for work in theatre. She has appeared in the ''Black Mirror'' episode " The Entire History of You" (2011), '' The Woman in Black: An ...

Sophie Okonedo Sophie Okonedo (born 11 August 1968) is a British actress and narrator. The recipient of a Tony Award, she has been nominated for an Academy Award, three BAFTA TV Awards, an Emmy Award, two Laurence Olivier Awards, and a Golden Globe Award. She ...

Antony Sher Sir Antony Sher (14 June 1949 – 2 December 2021) was a British actor, writer and theatre director of South African origin. A two-time Laurence Olivier Award winner and a five-time nominee, he joined the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1982 and ...

(In his final film role before his death in 2021), and

Nathan Stewart-Jarrett Nathan Lloyd Stewart-Jarrett (born December 4 1985) is a British actor. He starred as Curtis Donovan in the E4 series '' Misfits'' (2009–2012) and Ian in the Channel 4 series ''Utopia'' (2013–2014). He is also known for his theatre work, ...

Plot

Over the course of three days, eight government officials, a Member of Parliament, and a political appointee participate in a war-game which has taken place regularly among British

civil servants The civil service is a collective term for a sector of government composed mainly of career civil service personnel hired rather than elected, whose institutional tenure typically survives transitions of political leadership. A civil service offic ...

since the 1960s, as a way to help them formulate government procedure in the event of

nuclear war Nuclear warfare, also known as atomic warfare, is a War, military conflict or prepared Policy, political strategy that deploys nuclear weaponry. Nuclear weapons are Weapon of mass destruction, weapons of mass destruction; in contrast to conven ...

. In the depicted meetings, set in 2014, the group discusses possible UK policy in the fictional event of a nuclear detonation in

Mumbai Mumbai ( ; ), also known as Bombay ( ; its official name until 1995), is the capital city of the Indian state of Maharashtra. Mumbai is the financial capital and the most populous city proper of India with an estimated population of 12 ...

, India by a Pakistani organisation.Variety, 15 October 2014: ''London Film Review: ‘War Book’''
Linked 2015-08-13

Cast

as Mo * Nicholas Burns as James *

as Gary *

as Tom *

as Maria *

as Kate *

as Philippa *

as David *

as Austin * Morgan Walters as Frank

Premiere and reception

The film was first shown on 13 October 2014, during the

London Film Festival The BFI London Film Festival is an annual film festival held in London, England, in collaboration with the British Film Institute. Founded in 1957, the festival runs for two weeks every October. In 2016, the British Film Institute, BFI estim ...

. It featured as the opening film of the

International Film Festival Rotterdam International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) is an annual film festival held at the end of January in various locations in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, focused on independent and experimental films. The inaugural festival took place in June 1972, ...

on 21 January 2015 and saw a limited cinema release on 7 August 2015, and premiered on

BBC Four BBC Four is a British free-to-air Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It was launched on 2 March 2002

only four days later, on 11 August 2015. On

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews and ratings of products and services, such as films, books, video games, music, software, hardware, or cars. This system then stores the reviews to be used for supporting a website where user ...

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review aggregator, review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee ...

, the film holds an approval rating of 75% based on 8 reviews, with an average rating of 7.67/10. '' Variety's'' Charles Gant found the film's dialogue somewhat theatrical and compared it to

Roger Donaldson Roger Lindsey Donaldson (born 15 November 1945) is an Australian and New Zealand film director, screenwriter, and producer. His 1977 debut film, ''Sleeping Dogs (1977 film), Sleeping Dogs'', is considered landmark work of Cinema of New Zealand ...

’s '' Thirteen Days'', which proved that "a talkathon rooted in a historical moment of genuine peril can be far more gripping than any invented drama, and many audiences may find the final act of "War Book" to be risibly paranoid by comparison." ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...

''s Mike McCahill felt that "theatricality looms, but the variation of voices and viewpoints among the expert cast generates a rat-a-tat momentum." '' The List''s Nikki Baughan was much more enthusiastic, comparing it to

Sidney Lumet Sidney Arthur Lumet ( ; June 25, 1924 – April 9, 2011) was an American film director. Lumet started his career in theatre before moving to film, where he gained a reputation for making realistic and gritty New York City, New York dramas w ...

's 1957 classic ''

Twelve Angry Men ''Twelve Angry Men'' is an American courtroom drama written by Reginald Rose about the deliberations of a jury at a homicide trial. It was broadcast initially as a television play in 1954. It was adapted for the stage the following year, and ...

'', stating that "Jack Thorne's remarkable script is a masterclass in slow-burn tension, combining black-and-white facts with the murky greys of human emotion to drive home the fragility of social order in the face of incoming warheads."The List, 3 August 2015: ''War Book - Provocative and essential nuclear war-themed drama from Tom Harper''
Linked 2015-08-13

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:War Book 2014 films 2010s political drama films British political drama films Films set in 2014 Films directed by Tom Harper 2014 drama films Films with screenplays by Jack Thorne 2010s English-language films 2010s British films