War has played a key role in the history of the United States, from the nation's founding

right down to the present. War made the U.S. independent, kept it together, increased its

size, and established it as a global superpower. Understanding America's wars is essential for understanding American history.

Welcome to Key Battles of American History,

a podcast in which we discuss American history through the lens of the most important battles of America's wars.

Here is your host, James Early.

Thank you. your host, James Early. Hello and welcome to Key Films of World War II European Theater.

This is your host, James Early, as always.

In our last film episode, we looked at the excellent movie The Gathering Storm, which

was about Winston Churchill in the mid-1930s, up until he was added back into the government

near the end of the decade. And this week, we're going to be looking at another Churchill

movie, as we promised last time. It's sort of a sequel to the Gathering Storm, not exactly

planned that way, but it basically picks up not long after the Gathering Storm leaves off.

And that, of course, is Darkest Hour, a movie from 2017.

So before we get into the plot and all the other nifty things you like to hear about,

as always, I will just kind of

lay out the basics of the movie. The movie is two hours and five minutes long. It is very

highly acclaimed on Rotten Tomatoes. It has an average rating of 84% from the critics and 82%

from the fans. IMDB gives it 7.4, which is not great, but it's respectable.

The director is Joe Wright, and it stars Gary Oldman, Kristen Scott Thomas, Ben Mendelson,

Lily James, Ronald Pickup, and Stephen Delane, among many others.

It's based on an original screenplay, And this movie was loved by the awards shows.

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