Failure to control our behaviour destroys our weather. The impact of this failure will be surveyed in Montrose (at the LandxSea environmental-film festival) this weekend. But failure to forecast the weather also destroys military plans.
Military disaster is rendered in a compact prelude to “Pressure” (StudioCanal), showing now at the Montrose Playhouse. A coastline, shot from an arriving boat. The tide foams red, as if stained with the blood of the dead bodies beached beyond. World War Two commander Dwight (Ike) Eisenhower is haunted. “One mistake,” he says later, “that one mistake.——When I close my eyes, all I can see is failure.”
Many people consider the most attractive attribute of war films to be the knowledge of how they end. History, they say, is written by the victors. There is no reason to expect variety: the audience knows that “Pressure” concerns D-Day of 1944; that D-Day was a success; that it flipped the war in “our” favour; and that the Americans, under Ike, were in command. (Tom Selleck starred in “Ike: Countdown to D-Day” (2004), which covered the same events.)
A moustachioed Englishman is escorted to an opulent stately home. His name is Group Captain Jim Stagg, his title is Chief Meteorological Officer, and his job is to forecast the weather for D-Day. The h.q. is equipped with maps, drawing-pin boards, and other contrivances of military preparedness. An arc shot busies us with the comings and goings. The filmmakers’ control of the story never shakes. They value precision and a fat-free narrative. They forsake the needless introductions of the tour: of all the personnel there are only one or two of any importance. (Imagine a train speeding along a curveless section of the East Coast Main Line without making small-station stops.)
Half a dozen lines in which Group Captain Stagg, played by Andrew Scott, corrects a new subordinate’s work—“that’s wrong”—takes aim at the team’s process—“so that data goes unrecorded, does it?”—and refuses to share an office—“because I’ll need it exclusively”—establish his snippiness. “Get me the data,” he says, “that’s what counts.” Eisenhower prefers his fellow-American, Colonel Krick, who “been with me since [nineteen] forty-two, [and has] never seen me wrong.” The Brits are stiff; the Americans are fun. Krick boasts of Hollywood: “Who hasn’t seen ‘Gone With the Wind’?” he asks; “Me,” Stagg replies. Krick’s alternative method makes predictions based on historical patterns. “Who nailed the forecast for Alamein, …, Iran, Casablanca?” he asks. “When the atmospheric conditions are a match,” he says, “the weather follows suit.”
“There’s only one chief meteorological officer,” Stagg says, “and it’s not you.” Everybody plays the I’m-in-charge-round-here game. “I wouldn’t keep Eisenhower waiting longer than you already have,” Lieutenant Kay Summersby, played by Kerry Condon, says. Lt. Summersby acts as Ike’s Number One, describing her role as “driver, secretary, aide, nurse, everything really.” Ike, played by Brendan Fraser, values confidence and despises doubt. “A lot of pieces of the jigsaw are already in place,” he says. But Stagg values exactitude and despises bluster. “Long-term forecasting is really just educated guesswork,” he says. “Anything over twenty-four hours is considered long term methodologically.”
When Lt. Summersby reads Stagg’s report, she predicts that “they won’t like this.” “Force seven: are you sure?” someone asks at the briefing. “No,” Stagg says, “it’s an estimate. Confidence: poor, falling to very poor.” The big beasts of the campaign have strutty titles and quarrel with each other over the decisions; the Americans glower at the Brits and would wring their necks if they could. Mr Fraser, who has gained a few pounds, towers over Mr Scott, who has lost a few. “Are you absolutely certain?” Ike asks. “I can’t be absolutely certain,” Stagg says. “Krick’s forecasts have saved thousands of lives,” Ike says. “He’s been lucky,” Stagg says. “Good,” Ike replies, “I like luck.”
Stagg’s primness is slight compared with upper-class British Army General Bernard (Monty) Montgomery, played by Damian Lewis, whose confident, pomaded, left-parted hair tops a face snarling with pompous superiority and jerking with the long-established belief that everyone will sit up and listen to him. He undermines Ike with a comment about “actual battlefield experience.” Ike dresses him down, but Monty belts back. “Relax, old chap,” he says, “it’s not as if I’m telling them anything they don’t already know.” Mr Lewis is awarded many of “Pressure”’s best lines: “If we delay beyond Monday … all our meticulous preparation will be to naught.”; “The more prepared the enemy the more ruthless I become.”; “There is no eighteenth. None. None. None. None. None.” But “you’re the boss,” he says. “I am,” Ike replies, “and the final decision on the timing of D-Day will be mine and mine alone.”
The day before the battle, the officers attend a Christian service at a church in the grounds. The organ thunders. “All creatures of our God and King. Lift up your voice and with us sing. Alleluia! Alleluia!” The vicar asks God to “guide,” to “give courage,” and to “send blessings”: welcome to England, the home of the Established Church. Like the whole film, the sequence is alert and stirring and effective. The filmmakers create a cracking motion picture, not a multi-character Russian novel. And they resist the temptation to pad their movie with the kind of giddy, tedious war-movie scenes which are set on beaches and which feature hundreds of extras.
“Nobody here likes me very much,” Stagg says. Mr Scott measures the loosening of his fustiness (which parallels the shedding of his blazer and his tie and the unbuttoning of his shirt). He learns that political arguments aren’t won by banging on the facts. He builds alliances. He becomes likeable. Meanwhile, Mr Fraser shows us his five-star emotional range. But he doesn’t have long; the filmmakers are in a hurry. “What do you make of Stagg?” Ike asks. “Scottish,” Lt. Summersby replies. “Churchill says he’s a genius,” Ike says. “Men are too fond of that word,” she replies.
Adam Poole
11th September 2026
If you are interested in viewing this screening, please book your tickets here
