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Amateur Spy and the Marine Lawyer

 Monday: So Proudly We Hail! (1943)

           Davy is a lieutenant nurse serving in WWII. She is traveling with a group of nurses to help in WWII. They leave from Hawaii by boat. There destination is unclear as events unfold. There is an attack at sea by the Japanese. Another ship near her's is taken down. They take all the survivors on her ship. One of the survivors is a tech named John. Despite herself she falls for him. Soon they get word that the only place they can go to is the Philippines. Once at the base they find the other nurses exhausted. Davy and the other nurses jump in to help. They continue to get more injured. Supplies run low. Then they are attacked and have to move to another base and another. The women fight to take care of the injured and survive. I thought this movie was alright.

Tuesday: The White Angel (1936)

           This movie is about Florence Nightingale. She was born into a wealthy family. She doesn't have to work for anything. Florence is set to marry a nice man. She thinks her life lacks purpose. So she decides to be a nurse. Her parents aren't very supportive despite her father working on the board of a hospital. She goes to the only nursing school in Europe which is in Germany. After school she wants to start work right away but no one will hire her. Then she reads about the horrible conditions for the wounded in the Crimean War. Thanks to a family friend she is able to take a team of nurses over there. Once she gets there she turns the whole hospital around. Cleaning everything and organizing the different wings. The man in charge is not happy about her being there. He sends her to the front and she is almost dies from illness. But then even he can't deny she helped the hospital and does what he can for her. I thought this movie was good. She was an amazing woman. The death rate went from 56% to 6% after her work at the hospital. 

Friday: The Courier (2021)

           This is based on a true story. It takes place turing the Cold War. Greville is a normal English business man. One day he get a call from a man he met at a party named Dickie. He meets Dickie and Dickie's friend Emily for lunch. He finds out that Dickie works for MI6 and Emily is from the CIA. They have been contacted by a high ranking Russian official. He wants to give them intel on Russia's nuclear weapons and plans. They need to send someone who no one will suspect of being an agent. So they ask Greville to go. He reluctantly agrees. He sets it up with his company to travel to Russia and start a contract there. Once in Russia he meets the official who is named Oleg, or as Greville comes to call him, Alex. Alex starts to pass info to Greville and he takes it back to England. And sometimes Alex will come to visit him. They become friends. Both of them work hard to stop the Cuban Missile Crisis. They face many hardships to achieve their goal. This is a good movie. Benedict Cumberbatch (one of my favorites) plays Greville. He does a great job.

Saturday: The Mauritanian (2021)

         This is also based on a true story. Some time after 9/11 Nancy, a lawyer, decides to defend a man who is believed to be the head recruiter for the attacks. Mohamedou Slahi was taken from his home and sent to Guantanamo Bay. He was held there without any charges. Nancy works to find if there is any evidence of his involvement. If there is none he can be released. Working for the government Stuart is a colonel lawyer who wants to see that Mohamedou faces charges for his crimes. Nancy gains Mohamedou's trust and he tells her his story. He had no involvement. He was tortured at Guantanamo Bay until he confessed to things he never did. The government doesn't care if he really did it. They just want to take as many people down for 9/11 as they can. Nancy and Stuart both struggle to gain access to all the evidence and information gathered. Once Stuart realizes there is no evidence he steps down. He even works with Nancy to help Mohamedou. Nancy wins the case but he is still kept there for another 7 years. He was finally released in 2016 (or around there). So he spent almost 14 years there and was never charged with anything. (I'm not exactly sure on the years.) This was a good movie. All the acting was really good. It should have gotten Oscar nominations. Benedict Cumberbatch played Stuart. I was tempted to call this post The Benedict Cumberbatch movie and the Other Benedict Cumberbatch movie.  That poor guy having to deal with all that. They showed him in real life during the credits. He is a very nice guy. He forgave them and remained positive for most of the time. He is doing well now. 

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