 Come back to Think Tech, I'm Jay Fidel, and this is Movies You're Gonna Learn From, where George Kason and me get together and review movies that are good enough to learn from. And we care about learning, and movies are a great way to do that. Today, we're going to do Operation Mince Me, which is a very educational movie on many levels. George, tell us about the circumstances of this movie. This is a real movie, a movie based on real events. World War II, British naval intelligence, was able to think up this plot to fool the Nazi regime into believing that Allied naval forces were going to be initially landing in Greece as opposed to the truth that was Sicily. And they concocted this unbelievable complicated scenario where they were going to find a body, and they found the body of a homeless man that had died. He had swallowed rat poison because he was eating bread that had been smeared with rat poison. So basically they found this body, and they were able to make him into a fictitious navy officer by the name of Martin, something Martin. And they were going to take him, put correspondence on him in his bag and in his personal letters, and dump him off the Gulf of Cadiz in Spain, which as we've talked in other reviews, there was a connection with the Nazis in Spain, the Spanish under Franco. So they did this, but there was a lot of things that could have gone wrong. It was a complicated operation. And they were able to get this guy thrown in the water from a submarine, right? And they were able to fool the Nazi regime. And we didn't know until the end of this movie, you know, what had really, that they weren't successful, even though it was a true story, right? And because of this, the Allied forces got into Sicily, had very little opposition, right? And were able eventually to take Italy, which turned the tide of the war. So this was critical. And there were the two naval officers, Edward Montague, and what was the other gig? Yeah, the two naval officers had thought this thing up using another plan from 1939, I forgot the name of it, you know, that took fool the enemy. And this is basically what this old movie is about. And then you get into personal romantic things. And Evan Montague, his wife was sent to, because he was partially a Jewish heritage. And he sent his wife to America because they were afraid the Nazis may take England. And then he had a love affair with his secretary, you know. So they got into side things like that. And then the other guy, he was also in love with Montague's secretary. So these are all side stories. The key points here is fooling the enemy, winning the war. This was the actual turning point. Otherwise Hitler and his Nazis would have continued taking over. So that's the basics. Okay, let me add some thoughts on that. Surely. Yeah, the Nazis firmly believed that the attack was the assault was going to be in Sicily. And they knew it. These intelligence guys knew it. And their job was to redirect the Nazis to Greece. And they had to figure out a way to do it. And there was some very poignant moments, you know, they gave you the, when you want to call it, the difficulty of dealing with the bureaucracy in the Royal Navy. It was hard to get a reasonable plan by them. It was hard to do something creative in the Royal Navy. But they did and they got ultimately they got enough to Churchill. Churchill remarkable statement he made. He said, this is very unlikely to succeed. When can you start? Exactly. That's Churchill. Because he understood that you have to fake them out. And one of the statements they made in this movie was, you know, war leads to strange circumstances. And indeed, this is an example of that. The war is truce wrapped in lies. That's intelligence. That is how you fake out Hitler. So anyway, they came up with this plan that was unlikely to succeed. And it required all kinds of work. For example, the dead body they had was a guy who even I think he was a street person. He was drunk. And, you know, anybody making an autopsy in Japan would have found that he did not die from drowning, which was the cover story that he would have died from, you know, toxic alcohol. But what happened is they get into the autopsy room in Spain in Barcelona, I think. And he's been dead for months. And when the very expert autopsy surgeon started to open him up, the stink was unbearable. And all these guys in the room said, we can't hang around for this. Let's just write it down as in drowning, okay? But, you know, truth is, that doctor would easily have found that it was not a drowning. It's just that none of them could stand the smell. There were all kinds of false calls like that. And the other thing that I thought was really interesting, I don't know if you thought this, is that there was a mistake somewhere in the phony papers they made. It was something not logical about the way they presented this corpse and about these papers suggesting that the, you know, the invasion was going to be in Greece. But the intelligence guy in the Nazi side of it, he wasn't crazy about it. And there was a suggestion that he was part of the cabal that was trying to assassinate it. Nobody knew that. But he got these papers and he had to make the decision about whether to believe them or not believe them. And he knew in, you know, logic on it that he really shouldn't believe them. But because he didn't like Hitler, he decided he would believe them. And he redirected the Nazi Defense Force to Greece, which was also a stroke of incredible luck. Because it could have gone the other way just as easy. And if it had gone the other way, the Nazis would have been waiting for the invasion force and they would have shot up 100,000 Brits and American. So this was really a cliffhanger. You did, as you said, George, you didn't know until really got down to the end about whether the luck the Joss would work in their favor or not. It was very creative. It was really heady stuff. And it was, I hate to say fun, but it was a great intellectual challenge for them to come up with it, at least a plausible scam like this. And by George, sometimes plausible scams work. And that's what happened here. In terms of my reaction, really lucky. And then they also discussed the actual battles and then what's going on behind the scenes were what you just alluded to. The espionage, the intelligence, the fooling, the presenting things that are not true. So they're the two ways of fighting a war, just as you alluded to. So that was interesting yet. And then one subplot that you didn't mention is that the character, what was his name, Ewen, I guess, was a tremendous character. Colin Firth played that role. Right. Colin Firth. Yeah. And the secretary in their intelligence unit, Kelly McDonald, Kelly McDonald, who I think is one of the best actresses on the on the stage of screen right now. She's really terrific. She's, she's from Scotland, you know, she has a starchy brogue. I love that. Anyway, they made her up. She didn't look like herself the way that they made her up on the movie. She looked very darker hair and they had makeup on her. That made her look quite different. Well, they took you there. They took you to 1943, which is when all this happened, and on the period of six months or so. And they looked like they were in 1943. They all licked and acted and spoke. And you, that's one of the reasons I liked the movie is that there was a certain authenticity about it. But the subplot I want to mention is that Colin Firth is our hero and a brother who in fact was, he was a spy of some, some kind. And the Brits were very concerned that he would know, find out about what Colin was doing and report. And they were, they were very concerned about that. And they were, they were watching Colin's character to be sure that that didn't happen. And they were ready to take dramatic action like killing people if they found that the brother who was not particularly responsible, the brother who lived with Colin, it's the brother revealed anything. So it was, it was the whole thing about secrecy, about planning things, deceiving the other side, even deceiving the people on your side. But then nobody knows what's really coming down. And, you know, it took me back to the whole thing about World War II. It was a lot less sophisticated than what we do now. Best be a nudge then it was a lot less sophisticated. But the stakes were very high. You know what I, and I think of the, you know, Trump and NeuroLogo and national security on secrets, secrets that affect national security. And I think of, you know, the president of the United States doesn't take it seriously. It was an article a few days ago about how we use classified documents to write his to-do lists. I mean, really, you know, and, and I think, you know, a lot of people in this country have no idea about keeping things secret, you know, state secrets, national secrets, secret. And, and they don't realize that those secrets can make it or break it for you. And that was one of the messages of this movie. You had to keep it secret because otherwise hundreds of thousands of people would die on your watch because of what you did or didn't do because you kept your lips, you know, you know, when they say loose lips or, or not. So that, that's one of the great messages of this movie. In terms of the, the quality of the movie, the acting, Colin Francis, really good. And I said, Kelly McFarlane, really good. All the players really good. And the way they, they set up the historical circumstances and venues and all of the things that took place was really as faithful as you could imagine of the way things happened in 1943. I felt I was being transported there. Really. Well, the scenery was good, you know, the acting, as you said, was superb. Colin Firth and Kelly McDonald and all the others. And I'm trying to think if there's anything else that I wanted to say. You know, movies you can learn from. Where are we in today? We've got Putin in Russia who wants to be the next Peter the Great, expand Russia, you know, he wants to, that's, that's his main objective, long-term objective, that's everything he's doing that. And as you know, my view of Erdogan wants to be fatigued, the conqueror again. He wants to expand the Neo Ottoman Empire. So you've got these players and a few others, you know, you've got the theocracy in Iran and Afghanistan with the Taliban, right? And then you have Trump's people that are, they want theocracy here too, you know, that that's part of his, the whole agenda, right? So you've got all these problems around the world. And I don't think unless you all of Europe and America gets behind Ukraine and fights, you know, how are you, how are you going to turn Putin, you know, arrest his, his taking of all that land in Ukraine? I don't think this is a stopgap. So you look at the movie we just, we saw we were viewing how unity brought, you know, Hitler and the Nazis down. So if you want to look at the current, how do you parlay that view of how things were handled to the present day when we have multiple issues around the world? And you brought up Trump, but there's a lot of other issues. You know, so I mean, I look at you, the Ukrainian situation, and unless we actually, we and the Europeans get behind actual battles, I don't see Ukraine on their own being able to throw off the Russian yoke completely. So that's my view of things. Well, I've been thinking a lot about that, George, and you are absolutely right. Ukraine needs the United States, it needs support, it needs money, it needs weapons from the United States. And we are so casual, and Joe Biden is so casual, you know, I'm so chicken, if you will, about providing the aircraft and missiles and whatever else they need. And if they don't prevail, if they, if they lose to the Russians, it isn't going to be a pretty picture in this country, because Trump will attack Biden and the way he attacked him after the failure in the departure of Afghanistan, wrongly. He attacked them wrongly, but there will be a lot of people who will write Biden off if the Ukrainians do not prevail. And just because Biden has said I will help them, except he hasn't helped them that much, I would like to see us help them a lot. The other thing, going back to Churchill, when Churchill said, I don't know, this is an unlikely success, but let's do it. Then you had a small example of Churchill's leadership, and the way you said the Brits were unified in this war, they were. It wasn't just that there were, you know, bombs falling on them and rockets falling on them, some Germans that galvanized them. No, it was Churchill. He was a brilliant wartime leader, brilliant. And he knew how to get people together. He knew what to say, how to say it, where it went to say it. And he got people all together. And as a result, the British people, you know, never lost focus. Unfortunately, in the United States and for that matter, Europe, it's so easy for us to lose focus. And we are losing focus every day. We're losing focus. This is visible in the world. So the lesson, you know, of that movie is you've got to stay focused. You've got to have a focused and strong leader like Churchill and, you know, who will lead you through difficult times and keep you together. And who will not, you know, not what we hold, what lead the mission. And unfortunately, we don't have that. And that is going to hurt Ukraine, but ultimately it's going to hurt us. So if anybody's listening, I would say the lesson here is we better stay together on this issue. We cannot afford all the nonsense that's going on in Congress with the Republicans and the freedom caucus and the right-wing conservatives. That is so disruptive to the world order. And it is so permissive of fascism, so permissive of autocracy that it is a recipe for a disaster. We had better look back, look at this movie and learn from it. Precisely. You know, even with this Iranian deal they made, you know, six billion dollars, it's supposed to be for humanitarian purposes, but then, you know, you don't know if that's going to stick, you know. And then already another hostage has been taken from the West. So, you know, I got problems, as I've said before, with Joe Biden's foreign policy. As you said, not forceful enough, you know. I mean, Trump's BS, you know, what he did, you know, with the Abraham Accords. But he should, I mean, I'm a leftist kind of guy, but they wouldn't, if Bolton, he had let Bolton do that, what he won't Bolton wanted to do, and get rid of that regime, you know, in Iran. But we're dealing with that, too. We're dealing with that regime in Iran. We're dealing with Putin. We're dealing with the one, right, expansionist. So a little more firmness, you know. I mean, I never liked Reagan politically, but he was a firm guy, you know. He got up and he said something about Berlin Wall, you know, to take down this wall. So we, you know, there's problems right now with our government, you know, facing these things. And what's going to happen in Iran? I mean, in Ukraine, yeah. So this movie, as you said, is really gives a picture. And one of the problems I had with this movie is the guy who played Churchill. I didn't really think he was playing that role to a T. I had problems with the way he was playing Churchill, because I've seen, you know, videos of Churchill. It sort of didn't quite hit the mark. It wasn't forceful enough. It was something, something was missing in that, in that presentation of Churchill. So that, that was one of the things it didn't show the forcefulness or the, the, just who Churchill wasn't how he projected himself. So that, that's why I may not give this a 10. But other than that, the listens movies you can learn from of this movie are phenomenal. Unity in unity, there is strength. And you've got to have people who are smart, who can seek out of the box like Ewan Martin, you and the other guy, they thought out of the box, right? And they were able to literally save hundreds and thousands of allied lives by doing this. And this war would have dragged on and we might not even have won it. I mean, the axes may have won, you know? So key point, yeah. Yeah, well, you know, on that, you know, every day is a turning point in a war like this. And for that matter, every day is a turning point in the civil war we're having in this country. And every day is a turning point in the Ukraine war we're having in Eastern Europe. But I wanted to offer another thought to you, George, and that's this. We had a show earlier today where we talked about the platform, the vision, if you will, of the Democratic Party, both nationally and locally for that matter. And one of the speakers who I thought was inspired said, you know, the question put to them was, what can we do to activate, you know, the Democratic Party so that we are more likely to follow them? And so they are more likely to, you know, to provide the energy to reiterate, to invigorate, you know, the public, because they are losing it. And a lot of stuff been written about that. And the speaker on the program said, make movies. We have to make movies. And so make movies about what's happening, you know, the strum and the drum of the individual citizen and how this is also crazy in Washington. We're really not covering it. Now, the frontline on PBS, they make some pretty good movies. But we need much more of that. We need to, you know, explore this, examine this in detail. We need movie makers to show us what's going on, not only here in this country, but elsewhere in the world. And of course, in Eastern Europe, we're not doing that. I mean, we see the news, but the news is always so, you know, ad hoc. Let's let's see a careful examination of these things. So people understand the world in which we live and the world in which we will live if, if these inflection points go wrong, if we don't have the luck to prevail on our hopes. So it strikes me that this movie, Operation Mincemeat, was an example of a movie about an event, a series of events and characters, a series of strategies and successes and luck in 1943. But, you know, behind behind the movie makers, the writers, the protrusions, the actors, the conceptualizers of this movie, there is also the thought that they are affirmatively trying to teach us something about our world today, about the need for secrecy, the need for strategy, for creativity, you know, the need to win and to have unified, you know, public opinion about it, and to have a guy like Churchill who could bring people all country together. And so it strikes me that this movie, the Mincemeat movie, is an example of a movie where you really much could assume that the movie makers are trying to, they're trying to give you that message. They're trying to show you that. They're trying to affect your opinion and public opinion. So the speaker on our program this morning, you know, is really saying we need more movies like this. We have to teach people so it sticks. We have to cover these things where people are confused and whether there are those like Trump that would like to confuse them. We have to clarify it. So Mincemeat is an example of that, I think, and there are others too. There are other important movie makers and actors, producing directors. I'm sorry they're having this strike. I'm really sorry, because this is a time they should be writing and directing and producing those movies. But they're busy with the strike. And right now those movies could be a real problem solver because clarify what is going on for millions, tens of millions of Americans, but we're not having them. So I think that's one of the reasons I take from this Mincemeat movie. Yeah, my cousin's an expiring actor and he's been standing on the striking, you know, but one of the things you said that really is profound, not too many people like, you know, I read everything. I'm alert on taking New York Times, Washington Post, Economist, I read constantly, but most of the public is, you know, and I'm sort of suddenly retired. So I got a little more time on my hands and no kids, she didn't want kids. So bottom line is I have the time. But most of the public, they don't have the time. These movies are really the way to teach them because they don't get on all these new shows. They don't look behind the, you know, that's why Trump is so powerful. It seems that his constituency is not really highly educated. It's the people who don't have that much education. And they follow him. So these movies will actually teach the public. They don't have to read all these different newspapers and reports. They just have to watch the movie to get a perception of what's going on. So you read on Keon or Jay, you hit the bullseye. No, I worry that one day, the Trumpers are going to realize that they too can make movies and they'll make false movies to lie to us and they will lie to the base about these movies and they will bring people over to their side of public opinion. And it'll be too late for the Democrat. This is a five alarm fire. We've said that before and we meant it before. Now we mean it more that, you know, the country has to wake up on this or else. And that's one of the problems in the Democratic platform. You know, you could read and read until you're, you know, you're sleeping. You'll be sleeping. No, I get on Fox News and Town Hall. I want to understand where those I don't agree with are coming from. And there's already movies being made, you know, not to that amount, but there are movies being made in Trump's vision. And people watch these movies, you know, I mean, it's like sort of undercut, you know, it's not in the mainstream, but there are. And some of these crazy conspiracy theories, there's people putting out, we have the internet now. And, you know, you can have your own blog and say things that are totally, totally untrue, you know, I mean, as Armenians, we left Adam Schiff, you know, they're really painting him as a horrible, horrible man. And Trump just got on and said, what kind of things about him? And Trump is like a kid. He's like, he hasn't really changed his logo since he was in eighth grade. And that's the kind of things he calls this one a shitty, this one's, you know, he's got names, junior high school names for everybody. And there's people in our country who just eat this up. So, you know, you know, there are movies that are projecting his view of things. I mean, it just came out that some, I think CBS poll says that Trump is going to win by one point. Of course, that changes that there's always four or 5% that could be off. But the fact that there's a 5050 kind of thing here is very worrisome that this man who's being arrested, you know, January 6th stuff, you know, and I mean, they were, they were Republicans that were more honorable. I mean, I did agree with some of their viewpoints, but like Romney and, and, you know, Huntsman Junior, because as an Armenian, you know, American, I'd be like the Huntsman's, but I mean, they were all people. Trump is not honorable. And 50, 70% of Republicans are supporting him, even with his arrests. So what does that say about our populace? Well, what it says is that they have no idea what Hitler was doing to people. They have no idea what Stalin was doing to people. In fact, you know, you have your, your kids tell on you. You have people tell on their friends and all workers and family. You break down civil society in every way you can. I don't know if you remember, George, that we reviewed all quiet on the Western front. That's a movie that Hitler didn't like. So he got Goebbels at the Goebbels was his PR guys, I recall, to stop that movie. It was playing in Germany in the, I guess, early 20s, or maybe the late 20s. And what he did was he led a bunch of rats loose in the theater where it was premiering. And then he did something else to scare people and horse out of the theater. And they got the message that the movie failed in Germany. So Hitler got what he wanted. He was going to discourage a movie, any, you know, public expression of the fact that war is no good. Of the First World War was no good that many, many Germans were killed. And he was, he was going to, you know, affect public opinion that way. I suggest to you do that that could happen again, which is, you know, one reason why movies like Operation Minstrelate are important. It's not that they directly address what Trump is doing, what Hitler did. I mean, took Germany, what Stalin did, what Putin is doing now. So they just give you one truth, one philosophical approach. And you start building your worldview around that. That's what the movie maker intends. He's not going to, you know, make a speech about everything that happened. It's too big a target. But if he says, look, national security is really important, and keeping, you know, national secrets is really important. And winning together is really important. Then he's teaching you lessons that seem to relate to 1943, but in fact relate to 2023. And a little piece here, a little piece there, and Hollywood can do a lot to re-educate people about what it means to limit a democracy, a fragile democracy. Because Trump is in a lot of it's like gobbles, you know, all his lies. And he tried to change the truth, you know, about January 6. He's been known to be untruthful for many decades. I mean, this is nothing new with him. His businesses were built on untruths, and that he would go to court with counters to everything. And so, yeah, this movie, as you said, suddenly talks about lessons for today, domestically as well as foreign policy, you know, what's going on within our own nation with fake news, you know, and Trump is the key player with fake news. And I don't know, I think that, as you said, movies will help because public's not researching under the, I mean, you and I, I know we're alert, you know, they're not alert, they just go along with the flow until it's too late. And then once they lose their rights, you know, it could slip away. I mean, my dad was in 1923, he was in Weimar Germany, you know, they sent him to school there, paid in advance. They had to stay there till he graduated in school, they didn't pay, they had no money anymore. But then how that turned so quickly, you know, with the Hitler and the Nazis, that could happen here too. Yeah, we're right, there's a five alarm fire. And I don't know why the Democrats don't rise to the occasion, they don't. And I don't know why Hollywood is out there, you know, protesting and, you know, trying to squeeze more money out of the movie studios at a time when we really need to hear from them. We need to hear their best work. They have to get back. And they have to start making the movies we need to straighten out the country. Suddenly, one issue at a time. But, you know, to be striking and protesting and walking the pavement with their signs at this point in time, just seems to be the wrong thing. They are a very important force. And like our speaker this morning said, we need to make movies. This is a British movie, you know. I wish there were a lot of American movies that did the same thing. Citizens United has changed the whole complexion of what goes on politically, right? Even the Democrats, I mean, you know, I have an electric car because I don't think we should be beholded to all the oil countries, right of the world. But Democrats are not really fighting too powerfully. I mean, they did that thing in Alaska, you know, Biden said that they can't drill in Alaska. But the oil companies have a lot of power, you know. And Democrats are sort of going soft, Biden was, they're going soft on a lot of this stuff because there's a big election coming up. And they don't want to, they don't want to get these big corporations on the wrong side. So realize that the winning ticket is to be strong and to say what you mean and mean what you say, exercise leadership, the kind of leadership that Churchill had. And that, you if they are compromising everything, they're going to lose. That's the problem that I've had with, as much as I worked my behind offer, Obama to get him elected the first time around. And even Biden I worked to get him elected. It's the softness that's bothering. It's the wishy-washiness. You know, they've got to be more strong. And as I said, Citizens United has sort of made them a little afraid that they don't want all this big money working against them. But you know, and you said those movies that I mean the public, I mean, it's like, what is the public being fed? That's distorting their thinking. The thinking that it's not going to impact them if we have a theocracy. Exactly. They don't understand. They think whatever happens politically is somebody else's problem. And it won't affect them. I'm here to tell you, it will affect them in every way. Precisely. I mean, those of us, I mean, who have had family in autocratic countries with it, with genocide or massacres or whatever is the final, you know, kind of thing. I mean, I don't know if they really understand where we're heading. I mean, it's like it's incomprehensible to me how they just don't see it. It's like myopia. They don't see what's happening. But when Donald Trump gets up and with his silly baby stuff, right, but they don't understand what's going on. And I'm really unhappy with my Democratic Party for as you said, the mushiness. There's no fun. Look at Churchill. I mean, he that's why I didn't like the way the guy played. Churchill was such a powerful figure, you know, I think it's amazing guy, right? And for all his faults, Roosevelt was, I mean, I have major problems with him in the Holocaust. But he was forceful too. He was the guy in a wheelchair, you know, he sort of unified the country in whatever way, right? So that's the bottom line. You'll do a little cutting out. But I give this a nine, because I have problems that the idea, I love the idea. It was a real rule about a real, real situation. And brilliant, brilliant thinking. Of course, there was like you said a lot of luck. This could have gone really wrong. And it would have, how long the war and more people would have died. But with a little bit of luck, it worked. And they were able to get Italy to fall and then eventually Nazi Nazis. I don't know how you can parlay this into the Ukrainian situation right now. That's the key thing, you know, that that's playing into everything. And how we how we work it from there. You take care, Jay. How do you feel about this? What was your rating before we vote? I'd give it a 10. I agree that Churchill did not meet my view of him, my expectations. On the other hand, I saw this as a statement of British history. An iconic event that took place. It was, you know, classified for a long time after nobody knew about it. And it is a statement of how the British nerve and spirit and creativity, ball British thing, succeeded. And what does that tell you? It tells you to be patriotic. It tells you to be together. It tells you that this is a great country. And I think that statement was very important for the movie to make the movie a 10. But it's also very important for the British to see that now, to see that in terms of dealing with Ukraine and dealing with all the other issues that it has. And that's a lot of issues. And so I think we can learn from the fact that they cook an iconic moment and made it into a heart-rending, patriotic moment. That's why I give it a 10. Thank you, Jay. Thank you, George. We'll take it from here. All right. Talk soon.