Story of movie The Imitation Game :
The Imitation Game is a 2014 American historical drama film directed by Morten Tyldum and written by Graham Moore, based on the biography Alan Turing: The Enigma by Andrew Hodges. It stars Benedict Cumberbatch as British cryptanalyst Alan Turing, who decrypted German intelligence codes for the British government during the Second World War. Keira Knightley, Matthew Goode, Rory Kinnear, Charles Dance, and Mark Strong also star.
| The Imitation Game | |
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| Directed by | Morten Tyldum |
| Produced by |
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| Written by | Graham Moore |
| Based on | Alan Turing: The Enigma by Andrew Hodges |
| Starring |
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| Music by | Alexandre Desplat |
| Cinematography | Óscar Faura |
| Edited by | William Goldenberg |
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Release date |
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Running time | 114 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $14 million |
| Box office | $233.6 million |
The screenplay topped the annual Black List for best unproduced Hollywood scripts in 2011. The Weinstein Company acquired the film for $7 million in February 2014, the highest amount ever paid for U.S. distribution rights at the European Film Market. It was released theatrically in the United States on 28 November 2014.
The Imitation Game grossed over $233 million worldwide on a $14 million production budget, making it the highest-grossing independent film of 2014. It received eight nominations at the 87th Academy Awards, winning for Best Adapted Screenplay, five nominations in the 72nd Golden Globe Awards, and three nominations at the 21st Screen Actors Guild Awards. It also received nine BAFTA nominations and won the People's Choice Award at the 39th Toronto International Film Festival.
The film was criticised by some for its inaccurate portrayal of historical events and Turing's character and relationships. However, the LGBT civil rights advocacy organization the Human Rights Campaign honoured it for bringing Turing's legacy to a wider audience.
Screenplay
In 1951, two policemen, Nock and Staehl, investigate the mathematician Alan Turing after an apparent break-in at his home. During his interrogation by Nock, Turing tells of his time working at Bletchley Park during the Second World War.
In 1927, the young Turing is unhappy and bullied at boarding school. He develops a friendship with Christopher Morcom, who sparks his interest in cryptography. Turing develops romantic feelings for him, but Christopher soon dies from tuberculosis.
When Britain declares war on Germany in 1939, Turing travels to Bletchley Park. Under the direction of Commander Alastair Denniston, he joins the cryptography team of Hugh Alexander, John Cairncross, Peter Hilton, Keith Furman and Charles Richards. The team are trying to decrypt the Enigma machine, which the Nazis use to send coded messages.
Turing is difficult to work with, and considers his colleagues inferior; he works alone to design a machine to decipher Enigma. After Denniston refuses to fund construction of the machine, Turing writes to Prime Minister Winston Churchill, who puts Turing in charge of the team and funds the machine. Turing fires Furman and Richards and places a difficult crossword in newspapers to find replacements. Joan Clarke, a Cambridge graduate, passes Turing’s test but her parents will not allow her to work with the male cryptographers. Turing arranges for her to live and work with the female clerks who intercept the messages, and shares his plans with her. With Clarke's help, Turing warms to the other colleagues, who begin to respect him.
Turing’s machine, which he names Christopher, is constructed, but cannot determine the Enigma settings before the Germans reset the Enigma encryption each day. Denniston orders it destroyed and Turing fired, but the other cryptographers threaten to leave if Turing goes. After Clarke plans to leave on the wishes of her parents, Turing proposes marriage, which she accepts. During their reception, Turing confirms his homosexuality to Cairncross, who warns him to keep it secret. After overhearing a conversation with a female clerk about messages she receives, Turing has an epiphany, realising he can program the machine to decode words he already knows exist in certain messages. After he recalibrates the machine, it quickly decodes a message and the cryptographers celebrate. Turing realises they cannot act on every decoded message or the Germans will realise Enigma has been broken.
Turing discovers that Cairncross is a Soviet spy. When Turing confronts him, Cairncross argues that the Soviets are allies working for the same goals, and threatens to retaliate by disclosing Turing’s sexuality. When the MI6 agent Stewart Menzies appears to threaten Clarke, Turing reveals that Cairncross is a spy. Menzies reveals he knew this already and planted Cairncross to leak messages to the Soviets for British benefit. Fearing for her safety, Turing tells Clarke to leave Bletchley Park, revealing that he is gay. Heartbroken, Clarke states she always suspected but insists they would have been happy together anyway. After the war, Menzies tells the cryptographers to destroy their work and that they can never see one another again or share what they have done.
In the 1950s, Turing is convicted of gross indecency and, in lieu of a jail sentence, undergoes chemical castration so he can continue his work. Clarke visits him in his home and witnesses his physical and mental deterioration. She comforts him by saying that his work saved millions of lives.
- Benedict Cumberbatch as Alan Turing
- Keira Knightley as Joan Clarke
- Matthew Goode as Hugh Alexander
- Rory Kinnear as Detective Nock
- Allen Leech as John Cairncross
- Matthew Beard as Peter Hilton
- Charles Dance as Cdr. Alastair Denniston
- Mark Strong as Maj. Gen. Stewart Menzies
- James Northcote as Jack Good
- Steven Waddington as Supt Smith
- Tom Goodman-Hill as Sgt. Staehl
- Alex Lawther as young Alan Turing
- Jack Bannon as Christopher Morcom
- Ilan Goodman as Keith Furman
- Jack Tarlton as Charles Richards
- Tuppence Middleton as Helen Stewart
- David Charkham as Joan's Father, William Kemp Lowther Clarke
- Victoria Wicks as Joan's Mother, Dorothy Clarke
- Dominic Charman as Sherborne Student 1
- James G. Nunn as Sherborne Student 2
- Charlie Manton as Sherborne Student 3
Before Cumberbatch joined the project, Warner Bros. bought the screenplay for a reported seven-figure sum because of Leonardo DiCaprio's interest in playing Turing. In the end, DiCaprio did not come on board and the rights of the script reverted to the screenwriter. Black Bear Pictures subsequently committed to finance the film for $14 million. Various directors were attached during development including Ron Howard and David Yates. In December 2012, it was announced that Headhunters director Morten Tyldum would helm the project, making the film his English-language directorial debut.
Principal photography began on 15 September 2013 in Britain. Filming locations included Turing's former school, Sherborne, Bletchley Park, where Turing and his colleagues worked during the war, and Central Saint Martins campus on Southampton Row in London. Other locations included towns in England such as Nettlebed (Joyce Grove in Oxfordshire) and Chesham (Buckinghamshire). Scenes were also filmed at Bicester Airfield and outside the Law Society building in Chancery Lane, and at West London Film Studios. Principal photography finished on 11 November 2013.
The bombe seen in the film is based on a replica of Turing's original machine, which is housed in the museum at Bletchley Park. However, production designer Maria Djurkovic admitted that her team made the machine more cinematic by making it larger and having more of its internal mechanisms visible.
The film's title refers to Turing's proposed test of the same name, which he discussed in his 1950 paper on artificial intelligence entitled "Computing Machinery and Intelligence".
The Weinstein Company acquired the film for $7 million in February 2014, the highest amount ever paid for US distribution rights at the European Film Market. The film is also a recipient of Tribeca Film Festival's Sloan Filmmaker Fund, which grants filmmakers funding and guidance with regard to innovative films that are concerned with science, mathematics, and technology.
| The Imitation Game | |
|---|---|
| Film score by Alexandre Desplat | |
| Released | 24 November 2014 |
| Genre | Soundtrack |
| Length | 51:08 |
| Label | Sony Music Entertainment |
In June 2014, it was announced that Alexandre Desplat would provide the original score of the film. It was recorded by the London Symphony Orchestra at Abbey Road Studios in London. Desplat uses continuous piano arpeggios to represent both Turing's thinking mind and the workings of a mechanical machine. He said of the complexity of the continuity and structure of the score:
hen the camera at the end of the film has those beautiful shots of the young boy, the young Alan, and he's meeting with the professor who's telling him his friend Christopher is dead, and the camera is pushing in on him, I play Christopher's theme that we heard very early on in the film. There's a simple continuity there. It's the accumulation of these moments that I can slowly but surely play that make it even stronger.
The score received an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Score, losing to the score of The Grand Budapest Hotel, also composed by Desplat.
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