Is 'Dunkirk' Really About Brexit?

Recently the New York Times ran an op-ed from a columnist for the Times of London lamenting the timing of the release of Christopher Nolan's Dunkirk.“Nothing could be less helpful to our collective psyche as the country blunders toward Brexit,” wrote Jenni Russell. “The essential message of the film, with its narrative of heroic retreat in order to fight another day, cannot help but feed the national pride in Britain's capacity to triumph eventually, no matter what the odds. . . . Dunkirk is remembered so fondly only because, in the end, Britain was on the winning side. That wasn't down to our plucky spirit. It was because America, with its overwhelming resources, entered the war.”The revival of “the Dunkirk spirit,” Russell explains, represents is a “stunning misunderstanding” of what the country is really about at present. “We don't have the skills, the manufacturing base, the drive or the productivity we would need to take off as an independent nation,” writes Russell. “For years, Britain's inadequacies have been compensated for by its membership in the European Union. Now, they are about to become painfully apparent.”