Red Joan (2018) dramatizes the true story of a British physicist who conveyed critical information to the Soviet Union, during and after World War II, concerning British efforts to develop a nuclear fission bomb, an effort motivated by Nazi efforts to accomplish the same. Joan, the fictionalized protagonist, is a mixture of A-level intellect and the emotions of a woman hungry for intimacy, pursued by Soviet agents for her position in the British effort – and maybe their own, personal purposes. Those interactions draw thoughts concerning how the differing morality systems of England and the USSR interact, much to the detriment of those at the tip of the morality spear, demanding all of the tangible and / or intangible assets of their various operatives.
When the Americans hit Hiroshima and Nagasaki, she’s horrified at the slaughter and resolves to find a way to balance the international battlefield; or, maybe, she’s mislead concerning Soviet, and Leader Stalin’s, intentions. Much like international relations, her relations are murky, and her choices and maneuvering, well, are they successful? Did she make wise choices?
We’re mostly all still here, one can note, but then we must ask if that is a negative or a positive.
It’s a demurely intense story, touching on well-used topics such as male patronization of women and treatment of homosexuals in British society of the time (think Alan Turing), as well as the age-old interactions of hormonal needs with morality systems, actions taken based on imperfect information and ill-supported assumptions, and the morality of blackmail.
I wasn’t inspired by it, but I thought it was well-done and not all that historically inaccurate. You might not enjoy it, but it may make you think.
