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0 of 3 Premium Clicks used this month SUBSCRIBE Print + Online Subscriber Activation | Register x Forgot Password | Need an Account? subscribe | newsletter | deals Classifieds Jobs Autos Real Estate FEATURED » NEWS NOW Our View: Hear them out ... Jeffrey Gillespie: The importance of being earnest ... OSF will spend grant on improving disability access ... Our View: Hear them out ... Jeffrey Gillespie: The importance of being earnest ... OSF will spend grant on improving disability access ... MOVIE REVIEW Code-breaking thriller is a pleasure to watch Comment By Chris Honoré for Revels DailyTidings.com By Chris Honoré for Revels Posted Jan. 2, 2015 at 12:01 AM By Chris Honoré for Revels Posted Jan. 2, 2015 at 12:01 AM » Social News The Imitation Game; 114 min; Rated PG-13   There’s a line spoken in “The Imitation Game,” and later repeated, that captures the essence of this strikingly fine and intelligent period film. It is said for the first time to a young Alan Turing. He has suffered in boarding school because he is different, and so his only friend, Christopher, reassures him, “Sometimes, it’s the people no one imagines anything of who do the things no one can imagine.” Cut to Turing (Benedict Cumberbatch) some 10 years later. He has come to Bletchley Park in Buckinghamshire to volunteer to work on code-breaking. It is 1939, and war with Germany has been declared. Only in his mid-20s, he is already one of the most gifted mathematicians in England and possesses a preternatural ability to solve puzzles. What Turing does not possess is an ability to decode human behavior and so seems eccentric, tic-laden, and socially maladroit. In an interview for the job, he sits across from a naval commander; however, he is so off-putting that he’s soon asked to leave … until he mentions England’s most elusive challenge: Enigma. Although British Intelligence can intercept countless messages from the Germans regarding ship and troop movement, it cannot decipher any of them, for they are sent using a marvel of German engineering: the Enigma code machine. The Brits have captured, at great cost, such a machine. What they cannot do is puzzle out how to use it. Turing tells the commander, with confidence bordering on arrogance, that he, and he alone, can break the riddle of the Enigma. And so begins in earnest a remarkable film, one that follows Turing closely as he struggles against all odds, to include the cascading hostility of his colleagues and the growing doubts of the head of MI 16 (British Intelligence), Stewart Menzie (Mark Strong). What Turing is convinced he can do is build a machine (actually a precursor to today’s computers) that can defeat the Enigma. But it isn’t until he recruits Joan Clarke (Keira Knightly), also a math whiz, that he realizes he’s found a kindred spirit. It is evident that Turing is a savant when it comes to puzzles, hence “The Imitation Game” is filled with tension as Turing and his team push ahead relentlessly to find the key to Enigma. Time is of the essence. England is losing the war, slowly dying from overhead bombardments, while German subs sink their supply ships. But there is also the tension that surrounds Turing, for it is revealed that he is a homosexual, something that, in Britain, in 1942, is a crime. While his genius is breaking down secrets, this is a secret that he cannot reveal for it would mean the end of his work on Enigma. He understands that if the solution to Enigma can be found millions of lives will be saved and the war shortened. “The Imitation Game” is pure pleasure to watch, its narrative structure intelligent and accessible and engaging with a superb cast. And not to forget the remarkable irony inherent in Turing’s situation: While he sits and looks at the German machine, the Enigma, a typewriter of sorts, encased in polished oak, it’s clear that Turing the man is also profoundly enigmatic, a man of incredible intellectual gifts who can save the world but cannot save himself from the bias and hatred of the greater society he is forced to inhabit. Yet he was indeed a man who did things no one could then imagine. An aside: The story of Alan Turing is based in fact. What he accomplished in his short life has rippled outward, a stone thrown into a pond, and he is considered the grandfather of today’s computer.     By Chris Honoré for Revels DailyTidings.com By Chris Honoré for Revels Posted Jan. 2, 2015 at 12:01 AM » Comment or view comments Reader Reaction » STAY INFORMED Email NewsLetter Sign Up Today Sign up for our newsletter and have the top headlines from your community delivered right to your inbox. 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