\n<\/p>\n
This article is part of\u00a0<\/i>Upstream<\/a>,<\/i>\u00a0The Daily Wire\u2019s new home for culture and lifestyle. Real human insight and human stories \u2014 from our featured writers to you.<\/i><\/p>\n ***<\/p>\n Just in time for Father\u2019s Day comes the ultimate film for the men in your life: It\u2019s a war movie about the weather. Better, it\u2019s a movie about <\/span>monitoring the situation<\/span><\/a> and then making a decision about what the situation will become. It\u2019s an unexpectedly thrilling depiction of what it means to make hard choices, trust your instincts, and be decisive when a single call might turn the tide of a war.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cPressure,\u201d which is out in theaters now, tells the story of one pivotal decision near the end of World War II: how the Allies chose the exact time to storm the beaches at Normandy on D-Day. Its hero is meteorologist Captain James Stagg (Andrew Scott), who leaves his pregnant wife at home to report to General Dwight D. Eisenhower (Brendan Fraser) and lead a team of weather watchers. The Allies need one key forecast.<\/span><\/p>\n Stagg\u2019s American counterpart Irving P. Krick may have helped the filming of \u201cGone With The Wind\u201d by predicting good weather, but there\u2019s much more at stake now than Hollywood cash and Clark Gable\u2019s hair. It\u2019s 1944, the war has been raging for almost five years, and the Germans have held France for four. The details for this invasion must be precise. Waves that are too high mean boats will capsize. Clouds that are too thick mean pilots won\u2019t know where to fly. Conditions must be good, or at least good enough. Otherwise, thousands of lives will be lost.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cPressure\u201d is based on a play, which makes sense when you consider that it\u2019s mostly just people talking in various rooms. But despite a bit of a slow start, it rarely feels boring. From the tense, demanding score to Scott\u2019s minute facial changes, the film finds ways to command your attention. And it knows it might sound a bit dull.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cDid you know that weathermen are traditionally a little boring?\u201d Eisenhower\u2019s aide, Kay Summersby, quips to Stagg.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cHow dare you say that?\u201d he jokes. \u201cWeathermen, maybe. But how can the weather be boring? It feeds us. The weather can destroy us. Controls our daily life. I don\u2019t think that\u2019s boring.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n We know the stakes, but what drives the film is not the abstract fear of failure in battle but the internal moral struggles of its protagonists. Racked with guilt over a training exercise gone fatally wrong, Eisenhower wrestles with how to make a decision that could lead to the end of the war \u2014 or if, as one British Army officer puts it, they might as well start goose-stepping now.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cIf any blame or fault is attached to the attempt, it is mine, and mine alone,\u201d Eisenhower concludes hours before the attack.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Stagg proves his character by maintaining his forecast of poor weather even when everyone, including his colleagues, wants to believe in a cloudless sky. But he\u2019s still hesitant to attach any certainty to his forecasts, arguing that with the weather, nothing is certain. It was President Harry Truman who begged for \u201ca one-handed economist\u201d so he could stop hearing \u201con the one hand\u201d and \u201con the other hand.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n Here, what Eisenhower needs is a one-handed weatherman.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Fraser is an imposing presence as the general, and his secretary (played sympathetically <\/span>by Kerry Condon) acts as a voice of reason and an emotional center for the two men, telling Eisenhower to leave his guilt in the past and advising Stagg to let the general\u2019s outbursts wash over him.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Stagg is confident in his understanding of the weather, but not in his ability to make a decision that he himself has to own. After spending two meetings with high-level officials telling them that the weather on the day of the invasion is likely no good, he gets another chance to give Eisenhower a new forecast that could make the invasion possible after all. To make his case, he points to his charts.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t want to look at your damn charts,\u201d Eisenhower says. \u201cIt\u2019s a bunch of gobbledygook!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Finally, Stagg quits hiding behind his forecasts and makes a decision. \u201cMy official position is this: Go. You should go.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n When the D-Day invasion begins, \u201cPressure\u201d reminds you that we\u2019re talking about real events by interspersing actual footage from the war. Of course, the invasion, which happened on June 6, 1944, was a success. Years later, President Eisenhower would <\/span>observe<\/span><\/a> that the attack succeeded \u201cbecause we had better meteorologists than the Germans.\u201d The film is a celebration of that excellence \u2014 and of the courage it takes to make a monumental decision when the stakes couldn\u2019t be higher. <\/span><\/p>\n