Director: Anthony Maras
Cast: Andrew Scott, Brendan Fraser, Kerry Condon, Chris Messina, Damien Lewis
Screenplay: David Haig, Anthony Maras
100 mins. Rated PG-13 for war violence, bloody images, some strong language, and smoking.

At a certain point in life, each American male finds himself utterly enamored with World War II stories. It’s a rite of passage for males, especially fathers. If it hasn’t happened to you, know that the time in coming. In the realm of film, it almost feels like we’ve seen every possible permutation of WWII stories depicted on the big screen, so color me impressed with the new Anthony Maras (Hotel Mumbai) film Pressure, which views D-Day planning and preparation through a unique lens, asking the age-old question, “Hey, how’s the weather?”

In April 1944, a D-Day rehearsal known as Exercise Tiger ended disastrously, leading to the deaths of hundreds of American servicemen. Six weeks later, General Dwight Eisenhower (Brendan Fraser, Killers of the Flower Moon) has planned to execute D-Day, the largest and most important operation in the war, set to begin in 72 hours. He’s tasked Group Captain James Stagg (Andrew Scott, Wake Up Dead Man), a meteorologist, with confirming the weather for the day of the operation. As the timer runs down, Stagg clashes with Irving Krick (Chris Messina, Birds of Prey) over the proper prediction of weather patterns, with both having completely different findings that could change the tide of the war.

Playwright David Haig adapts his stage play for the big screen alongside Maras, and they’ve crafted a boiler-plate tensioner that works surprisingly well, even going in knowing the general outcome of the story. The idea that the success or failure of D-Day could all come down to the weather predictions doesn’t inherently sound like an interesting nugget for a dramatic thriller, but Haig and Maras have crafted a film that, like Conclave just a few years ago, is mostly people in rooms talking but creating genuinely exciting drama from it. The screenplay seems to understand that its audience will know enough about the outcome, and Haig cleverly included a subplot for Stagg that heightens the tension of his character and focuses on elements that the audience may not know enough about.

Pressure has mostly strong performances, with highlights from Andrew Scott and Damien Lewis (Once Upon a Time in Hollywood), who plays Marshall Bernard Montgomery, who outlines the importance of the mission over the dangers of the weather. These two in particular disappear into their roles and provide some of the most bombastic moments of the film.

I’ve often been critical of play adaptations that ignore some of the benefits of the big screen, avoiding adapting and merely translating the play to film form, but Maras makes a number of smart decisions in turning Pressure into a big screen event, most notably in his D-Day sequence. It’s a risky choice in a post-Saving Private Ryan landscape in trying to depict D-Day, and Maras choosing a more intimate focus on singular soldiers, up close and personal in trying to accomplish the mission. Sure, it’s probably a cost decision, but it also works because it’s not trying to outdo Spielberg’s version. Throughout the film, Maras reminds us of the young individuals risking their lives while old men make dangerous decisions in small moments as they await their ultimate fate, and these little moments help to provide plenty of scale and tension to the back-and-forth of the weather, and it makes the D-Day sequences all the stronger for it.

With reflections of another WWII story, The Imitation Game, Pressure makes for a compelling behind-the-scenes of a seemingly inconsequential element of the war, and it makes a case for some of the oft-forgotten minds who helped shape the state of the war and the world embroiled in it. Strong performances and a compelling script uplift the packed state of WWII cinema, and director Anthony Maras, whose previous film was much more action-heavy, successfully makes this a very tense, breath-holding experience. Pressure showcases that, as Stagg states, weathermen can be boring, but weather is not.

4/5
-Kyle A. Goethe