The Turing Enigma

I was sadly disappointed with this short film. Had no idea what story was being told here, moreover couldn't comprehend the dialog because 1) the British dialect; 2) poorly enunciated; 3) an overly broad dynamic range of the audio had me throttling the volume continuously, and 4) no subtitles. I mean, would it really have cost so much to add subtitles? At least the story could have been followed.

The black and white did nothing for the story either, other than make it unpleasant to watch. But the lack of subtitles, coupled with my inability to understand 85 percent of the dialog through the wretched audio, made me thankful I only spent $10 on it.

Having recently heard that the director Pete Wild was a brilliant but deranged mathematician I thought I had to check this film out! It did not disappoint! You could tell by the apocalyptic atmosphere and off the wall script that this film was being created by an unhinged genius.In years to come this will be a cult classic!

A thriller celebrating the work and tragic death of persecuted genius Alan Turing...

The film was shot on RED, in Manchester where Turing lived, worked and died, with modern-day sequences in black & white, and colour flashbacks to Turing in the 1950s

Turing himself was a lifelong lover of codes and treasure hunts, and during the war he actually buried his life savings at Bletchley Park in case the Germans won... only to find that after the war he couldn't crack his own coded map!

The film starts in the modern day, where a postcard from Turing turns up as part of the celebrations to mark what would have been his 100th birthday in 2012... in code it provides the key to understanding a series of strange postcards Turing actually wrote just before his death... and within them is the solution to one of the greatest unsolved maths problems.

With flashbacks to Turing the film is a pacey race to crack the code...

I had strong hopes for this, for two reasons -- I'm a big fan of the Turing story, and consume every doc and feature film about Turing I can find, and because this one had high ratings on IMDb, at about 7.6. I give it a 6. First, the low budget look that pervades throughout.. Sure, it was only about $130,000-ish to make, which requires a lot of corners to be cut. But that notwithstanding, it looked TOO cheap, resembling an edgy car commercial more than a dramatic film. The lack of almost any extra actors became glaring and and annoyingly distracting, making me think this was a post-apocalyptic movie because there were almost no other humans in it. In one scene they talk in a movie theater without anyone shushing them, and most of the rest of the acting is off-key, the emotions often unexplained. The dialogue is rambly without charm; it's not ab-libbed, it's just saggy and flaccid, and what's worse -- it's a tad mumbled and delivered overly-fast, as if it were the actors' first nervous take that the director had to keep in the final cut, again, for budget reasons. The lead actor isn't up to the task of carrying the project, and doesn't get as much help from the supporting cast as he needed.

I can't help but think the filmmakers used the very good Aronofsky film Pi (1998) as their baseline and inspiration, a BW movie about mathematics, puzzle solving and paranoia that, like this movie, even includes discussions of Plato, if I recall correctly. That's pretty much where the resemblance ends, for as many ways as Pi succeeded, this movie fell short.

Then there's the sound. At times it's a bit echoey, hollow and stark, again a reflection of the budget. The sound lacks layer and perspective, resulting in all the voice levels being about the same, regardless of which room they're coming from or how many walls separate the voice from the character's POV. The shot choices aren't bad, effectively going for a poor- man's Hitchcock thing. But then there's the EDITING, which instead of keeping me merely guessing in a good mystery kinda way, instead kept me frustrated and reaching for the mouse to turn it off. If you don't watch carefully, you'll easily get lost trying to figure out the point of the whole story.

This would be an above-average student effort, but it's not ready for primetime, and certainly not ready to be judged by primetime standards. For more reviews, check us out at Movies With Greg and Chris on FB.

I loved everything about this film. Im not into my art house films, but this indie flick was fantastic. Its shot in Manchester, I know this as i recognize landmarks and streets but its a Manchester I don't recognize... its clinical, empty... almost has a post apocalyptic feel. This adds to the feel of the film.

The acting was great too. Odd snippets of humor were a warm welcome.

I particularly loved the colour Turing scenes.... I would like to have seen more of that. I would like to have learned more about Turing and did expect that when I sat down to watch the film, but i wasn't disappointed.

Good stuff :D