Director
James Hawes

Starring
Anthony Hopkins, Johnny Flynn, Helena Bonham Carter and Romola Galai. 


In his feature film debut, Director James Hawes has shone a light on the humanitarian efforts of Sir Nicholas Winton, who in the 1930’s was a part of an incredible group of people who helped rescue at-risk Jewish children from Prague before the outbreak of WWII. Johnny Flynn and Anthony Hopkins play Winton between the 1930’s and 1980’s scenes, which focus on both the evacuations themselves, and the whole endeavour coming to light in a public way through the British television show That’s Life in 1988.

Nicholas (Nicky) Winton was born Nicholas Wertheim in Hampstead, London in 1909 to Jewish-German parents. In early childhood the family name was changed to Winton and the family converted to Christianity, in part as an attempt at integration, but also due to the rise in antisemitic sentiment gaining traction in Europe. Despite this shift away from his Jewish roots, when tensions were escalating against Jews in the late 1930’s, Nicky put aside his work as a London stockbroker and agreed to help a friend of his (Martin Blake) in Prague to rescue as many children as possible from the imminent threat of Nazi occupation. 

One Life focuses on a young Nicky (Johnny Flynn) as he teams up with Trevor (Alex Sharp) and Doreen (Romola Garai) in Prague as they put together a plan to get as many foster families in England as possible to place the displaced children who have recently relocated to Czechoslovakia to flee Nazi persecution. Soon after, Nicky moves back to London to do the groundwork on finding families for placement and harassing members of parliament to approve asylum for these Jewish refugees, whilst Trevor and Doreen often undertake the riskier task of moving the children from Czechoslovakia to Great Britain. As we flash forward, we see the toll the whole operation took on Winton as an older man (Anthony Hopkins), as he never knew what became of the children that came across to England or the ones that were still in Prague when war ultimately broke out, that was until the sensationalist television program That’s Life heard of his exploits and did some investigative work into the children that Nicky helped save. 

The film is a wonderful exploration into one of the many harrowing experiences for Jewish people in the lead up to the second world war. Parents ultimately having to give up their children in an effort to ensure their safety, which given that none of them could have even imagined the atrocities that were just around the corner for the 6 million Jews murdered by the Nazi regime, that decision was a risk in itself. One of the best things about the way this story is told is the decision not to make those horrific events a feature of the film. We’re all well aware of what brutality unfolded, so there was enough suspense in knowing what was on the line for these children without it having to be shown. The only criticism of the storytelling is that more wasn’t done to highlight the efforts of Trevor, Doreen and the others that were doing the real grunt work in an increasingly dangerous environment. So much emphasis has been put on Winton’s involvement since the 1988 airing of That’s Life which also included a Knighthood for his humanitarian efforts as well as a nomination for a Nobel Peace Prize, however most of the others involved died without any recognition of the lives they saved. This film would have been a great opportunity to correct that. 

The performances of Flynn and Hopkins are wonderful, with Hopkins once again showing why he is one of the most highly rated actors in Hollywood. The slow build to a moving and emotive crescendo in the later stages of the film is well metered and directed to perfection, showing that Hawes has a promising film career ahead of him after much success with television. Overall, One Life is an incredible, moving experience and an absolute gem of a film. 

One Life is in cinemas now.