A Call to Spy Movie Review: Women Power Rule in Radhika Apte’s WWII Spy Drama (LatestLY Exclusive)

A Call To Spy Movie Review: There is a quote in Lydia Dean Pilcher's A Call To Spy that pretty much sums up the film's intent and also subverts your ideas about a female spy movie. When Vera Atkins' (Stana Katic) senior asks her to find female recruits who are good-looking, she nonchalantly asks him, for whom - him or the Germans. Sure, the protagonists are all played by good-looking women, but for a change, they don't have to use their sexuality to get their missions done. A Call To Spy: Radhika Apte’s Espionage-Thriller Set in World War II to Premiere on Amazon Prime Video in India on December 11.

Based on real-life World War II stories, A Call to Spy revolves around three women, who had important roles to play during the British's warfare against Hitler's Nazi Germany. Set in the year 1941, when France was under German control,  England wanted to expand their spy network in their neighbour to anticipate Germans' next move and create an uprising there.

Winston Churchill, the PM then, agrees for Special Operations Executive- a spy training program that also trains women, an unheard of idea for their intelligence agency. The task for recruiting the women spies lands on Vera, a Jewish immigrant who works for SOE and awaiting her British immigration. Among others, she choose two unusual candidates - Virginia Hall (Sarah Megan Thomas), an American who had lost a leg in a freak accident and wants to be a diplomat, and Noor Inayat Khan (Radhika Apte), a British wireless operator born to an Indian father who is pacifist in nature.

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A Call To Spy follows these three women, as they try to establish a spy network in one of the most dangerous territories. With proper lack of resources or money, unreliable equipments, double-crossing and even a dismissive attitude from the tops, the women find their work challenging. The focus is bit more on Virginia's character, with Sarah, who also serves as the writer and producer, getting ample opportunities to expand her character (let's ignore the self-pandering).

Like I mentioned before, it is a nice touch to see these brave women not being used as honeypots, but rather tackling on the same challenges as the men in their field, while also having an addition battle of gender disparity. A Call to Spy is engrossing in parts, more pacy in the latter portions of the film. There are a couple of evocative moments that disturbs you, while the movie also reminds you that the anti-Semitic attitude wasn't just restricted to Germany.

Where it isn't engaging, I found the film rushing through several important interludes of the narrative, be it the training portions, and the establishing of the network. At times, this rushed nature also affects the character development.

Overall, though, A Call To Spy is a decent enough spy drama, that refuses to compromise on acknowledging the pitfalls of England, and showing how their oversight cost the deaths of their own men.  Wonder if such an self-critical insight would ever work in a army-based film made in 'New India'.

The three ladies are wonderful in their roles, with Sarah Megan Thomas getting more opportunities to shine and Stana Katic pitching an act that is charismatic as well as brittle. Our very own Radhika Apte impresses whenever she lands on screen, though I found her character to be the weakest among the trio. Her Noor Inayat is used more as a supporting character rather than the main focus, though the closure of her arc is emotionally affecting. At least, there is one British film that acknowledges Indians did fight on their behalf in a World War. Even if the character we have here is half-white! Radhika Apte Speaks on Nepotism, Says 'We Have Supported It a Lot and It’s Not Just the Film Industry'.

Yay!

- Engaging in Parts

- The Three Leads Do Justice to Their Roles

Nay!

- Rushed in Other Parts

- Little More Focus Needed on Noor's Character

Final Thoughts

A Call To Spy is a contained spy drama that proudly flaunts in showing that it wasn't an all-male valour show during one of the worst wars in human history. A Call to Spy is streaming on Amazon Prime Video.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Dec 11, 2020 12:01 AM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).