One Life Review

Nicholas Winton is a famous humanitarian who helped save 669 children from German-occupied Czechoslovakia. His story is dramatised in the film One Life.

In 1938 Nicholas Winton (Johnny Flynn) is a stockbroker who travels to Prague to help the British Refugee Council with the evacuation of political refugees. However, when Winton visits a refugee camp and sees the desperate plight of many children he decides to act and extend the Kindertransport. To achieve this Winton has to gain public support, arrange for foster families, and battle Whitehall.

In 1987, the elderly Winton (Anthony Hopkins) reflects on his life and re-discovers a scrapbook from his time in Prague. Winton ends up receiving media attention despite his modest nature.

Nicholas Winton has been called the British Schindler because of his efforts to save people from the Holocaust. One Life borrows heavily from Steven Spielberg’s classic Schindler’s List. Both films were about ordinary men who took extraordinary actions to save people from the Holocaust and were emotive films. The Holocaust was one of the darkest chapters in history and there have been many great films about the subject like The Pianist, The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas and Son of Saul, and One Life aimed to make its mark.

One Life was a weepy, guaranteed to make you shed tears. Many people in the audience did react to the film and my eyes did water. It was easy to achieve that considering Winton that was trying to save children and he was looking at the dire situation many of the children were living in. Many were out in the cold and snow, living in ruins, and starving. There was a focus on one girl who was no more than 12 and had to care for an orphaned baby. Despite the best effects of Winton and his team, they weren’t able to save everyone. The older Winton reflected on his work back in 1938 to 1939 and thought of the children he couldn’t save rather than the ones he did save. Older Winton’s modesty made him think he only had a minor impact when in reality he had achieved a lot more than he thought. One scene in the TV studio did feel similar to a scene at the end of Schindler’s List and I’m surprised Winton didn’t have a ‘I could have done more’ moment.

One Life also emphasised Winton’s relationship with some of the children. The film showed he was good with children. His first action in the refugee camp was to give children bits of chocolate and he had a rapport with a girl because of their love for skiing. Winton was concerned for the young girl with the baby. As the film progressed Winton became more emotionally invested in many of the cases and it took an emotional toll on the man.

Flynn and Hopkins were both as great as Winton. Flynn had a lot of humanity as the younger man trying to do the right thing and Hopkins was playing a charitable gentleman who could tell a joke or funny story. It made man a little more human and relatable. I thought Flynn was in his late 20s, so it was a surprise to find out he’s 40 in real life.

One Life aimed to be an accessible film. It had a 12A rating in the UK so it could reach a wider audience and it did feel like One Life could be a film that could be shown in schools. The focus of the film was on the saving of children and it was about the intensity of the situation. There was no violence like in other Holocaust films. This will make One Life sound boring, but it was a film about administration. Winton only spent a week in Prague and most of his work was conducted in London. He had to run a press campaign to raise funds and find foster parents, while Winton’s mother (Helena Bonham Carter) had to navigate through the Immigration Department. Bonham Carter is a great actress, and she was strong, determined, and caring as a German immigrant.

Whilst One Life was a historical drama, the filmmakers wanted to make some political commentary about today. One of the first scenes in the film was Winton listening to the news saying there were protests outside a refugee processing centre and mentioning Black Monday, which led to Winton criticising banking deregulation. When a Rabbi asked Winton why he wanted to help he said he was a ‘socialist and a European’ and this statement could be interpreted as a reference to today’s political goings on. Winton had to fight the British government’s reluctance to accept children from outside Germany and Austria. establishment put many hurdles in front of Winton and his campaign.

One Life was a well-meaning film that told an important story. It was enhanced by a talented cast and generated an emotional response.