“Official Secrets” is based on the true story of 27-year-old Katharine Gun, Mandarin translator for the British equivalent of the U.S. National Security Agency.
In 2003, she leaked an NSA memo requesting that Britain help blackmail members of the U.N. Security Council to compel them to vote for a resolution to justify the Iraq war.
It’s a story of “cooked” data and British governmental lies; a woman attempting to prevent an illegal war; a Kafkaesque British legal system in which consultation with one’s lawyer is a violation of the Official Secrets Act; the ever-present tension between the desire to do what is morally right and fear of punishment.
AND...the ending is a complete surprise.
“Official Secrets” (2019, U.K.) screens Sunday, March 27, 1:30 p.m., at Cinemagic, Plaza Bugambilias in Ajijic. Mask and proof of vaccination required.