Guest post by Constance Hastings.
Stories of war, spies who risk their lives in service of their country’s security, daring civilians who step up in heroic measures, are the stuff of good tales and great movies. When based in historical fact, the appeal is all the greater. Real danger heightens the tension. Hope for a good outcome despite fear and great risk makes the story all the more compelling. We can’t get enough of it.
Operations Mincemeat, based on the writing of Ben Macintyre and now a film streaming on Netflix, is such a story. In 1943, British intelligence is tasked with devising a scheme to divert the Germans from preparing for a landing by the Allies in Sicily. The trick is to have the Nazis believe the invasion instead will be in Greece. While they build defenses there, the Allies would have greater success and fewer casualties when they come ashore in Italy.
The assignment is given to the Twenty Committee, covertly named because the numeral 20 in Roman Numerals is XX, and the aim of their mission is to double cross the enemy.
Ewen Montagu and Charles Cholmondeley aided by secretaries Hester Leggett and Jean Leslie devise the bizarre plan. A cadaver is recruited to be dressed in British uniform planted with a phony ID and false papers indicating the invasion will be in Greece.
Dropped by a submarine in the Gulf of Cadiz, it is found by Spanish fishermen. Though there are tense and uncertain moments in the plot, orders subsequently are given to invade Sicily. Reports come in that casualties were low. Ultimately lives were saved because this strange, almost unbelievable mission was accomplished.
Throughout the film, one character is seen typing a story. Ian Fleming is that writer, giving a historical basis to the later development of his world-famous spy and hero, James Bond. With all this dramatic suspense based in actual events that enhance best-selling fiction, what’s not to love?
Yet, on a deeper, spiritual level, the story models another which occurred nearly 2000 years before. It was then, a person, though dead, was given new life in an almost unbelievable manner, saving the lives of many. Operation Mincemeat is a reflection of Jesus’ defeat of death and evil on the cross by his resurrection.
The public craves stories of real heroes fighting battles to save the world against evil which would destroy life. Yet that narrative has already been written. Stepping back, God’s story and real work in individual lives is a strange tale, bizarre and unbelievable and often told.
The Twenty Committee, though assigned to trick the enemy, adds another dimension in this alternate lens of the impact of Operation Mincemeat. The corpse’s new identity was Major William Martin. In 1997, his real name was revealed as Glyndwr Michael, a vagrant whose life possibly ended by suicide. But his death was not the end of his story as he is honored as a hero for the giving of his life a second time.
Likewise, though the film writers admit to some poetic license in the plot, two other characters are changed. Ewen Montagu and Jean Leslie are portrayed as being attracted to each other even as Montagu’s wife and family have relocated to the United States to escape the war.
Secretive, intimate work could have tempted them to give into their passion. But they were Instilled with the idea that betrayal of relationships, personal and patriotic, is to be resisted. Montagu remains faithful to his marriage and reunites with his wife, and Leslie transfers to another position in Special Operations, later marrying a soldier. Their lives also find a second story.
In both instances, lives are reversed by this mission. Such is the message beneath and above these portrayals, one enacted through the Cross of Christ which finds double meaning in Operation Mincemeat. We can’t get enough of it.
Constance Hastings is the author of The Trouble with Jesus Blog found at https://constancehastings.com. Please check out her other writings and subscribe to her blog at https://jesustrouble.substack.com/.
To learn more about seeing movies through a Christian worldview, take my quiz here and get a free download about Christian worldviews.