One Life

Based on true events, One Life follows British stockbroker Nicholas Winton (Johnny Flynn) as he strives to save the lives of countless children during the Second World War. (Anthony Hopkins plays the character during his later years.) Filmmaker James Hawes, working from Lucinda Coxon and Nick Drake’s screenplay, delivers a somewhat generic yet increasingly involving historical drama, as the movie boasts (or suffers from) a first half that contains few wholeheartedly compelling elements and attributes – with the arms-length atmosphere perpetuated by a series of set-in-the-past sequences that are hardly as effective or affecting as Hawes has surely intended. (And as typically terrific as Hopkins is here, his scenes suffer from a lack of context that ensures they fare just as poorly, ultimately.) There’s little doubt, then, that the picture grows more and more compelling as the stakes are raised and Nicholas’ efforts become more frantic, and while the climactic WWII sequences are indeed gripping, it’s in the final few present-day interludes that One Life becomes the rewarding, tearjerking success its premise might’ve indicated. (Hopkins’ stunning efforts here play a key role in cementing the picture’s impact, to put it mildly.)

*** out of ****