Review: World War II drama ‘Anthropoid’ belatedly comes to life

The mission was one of monumental daring, and its impact would be felt throughout Europe’s anti-Nazi underground. Yet somehow Operation Anthropoid, a plan to assassinate the Third Reich’s No. 3 man, is a little-known chapter of World War II. In the enlightening but seldom riveting drama “Anthropoid,” director Sean Ellis poses compelling questions and stages a couple of heart-pounding action sequences, including a climactic siege pitting seven men against SS troops, that are not just tense but poignant. Too much of his film, though, feels more preserved than alive.

Ellis (“Metro Manila”) and co-screenwriter Anthony Frewin (longtime assistant to Stanley Kubrick) tell the rarely told tale from the perspective of resistance fighters Josef Gabčík (Cillian Murphy) and Jan Kubiš (Jamie Dornan). After parachuting into occupied Czechoslovakia in December 1941, they set in motion a plot to kill Reinhard Heydrich, whose nicknames included the Butcher of Prague and the Blond Beast.

While lying low, they fall for the women posing as their girlfriends (Charlotte Le Bon, Anna Geislerová). Love is a necessary act of hope for Jan, while the steelier Josef, who understands that theirs is probably a suicide mission, considers it a form of wishful thinking. The movie both embraces and questions the romance of heroism, a provocative paradox that would have had more dramatic oomph if the screenplay were less staid, the characters more fully fleshed.

Ellis, serving as cinematographer, shot in many of the events’ actual locations, and the film’s beauty can be distractingly self-conscious. But “Anthropoid” does break through the historical aspic — too late, yet unforgettably, in its final, shattering scenes.

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‘Anthropoid’

MPAA rating: R, for violence and some disturbing images

Running time: 2 hours

Playing: The Landmark, West Los Angeles