The Imitation Game

The Imitation Game is a 2014 historical thriller film about British mathematician, logician, cryptanalyst and pioneering computer scientist Alan Turing who was a key figure in cracking Nazi Germany's naval Enigma code which helped the Allies win the Second World War, only to later be criminally prosecuted for his homosexuality. The film stars Benedict Cumberbatch as Alan Turing, and is directed by Morten Tyldum, with a screenplay by Graham Moore based on the biography Alan Turing: The Enigma by Andrew Hodges.

The film's screenplay topped the annual Black List for best unproduced Hollywood scripts in 2011. After a bidding process against five other studios, The Weinstein Company acquired the film for $7 million in February 2014, the highest amount ever paid for US distribution rights at the European Film Market. It had its world premiere at the 41st Telluride Film Festival in August 2014. It also featured at the 39th Toronto International Film Festival in September where it won "People's Choice Award for Best Film", the highest award of the festival. It had its European premiere as the opening film of the 58th BFI London Film Festival in October and was released theatrically in the United Kingdom on 14 November, and in the United States on 28 November.

In terms of historical accuracy, while the broad outline of Turing's life as depicted in the film is true, a number of historians have noted that elements within it represent distortions of what actually happened, especially in terms of Turing's work at Bletchley Park during the war and his relationship with friend and fellow code breaker Joan Clarke.

The Imitation Game was both a critical and commercial success. The film was included in both the National Board of Review's and American Film Institute's "Top 10 Films of 2014". At the 87th Academy Awards, it has been nominated in eight categories including Best Picture, Best Director for Tyldum, Best Actor for Cumberbatch and Best Supporting Actress for Keira Knightley. It also garnered five nominations in the 72nd Golden Globe Awards and was nominated in three categories at the 21st Screen Actors Guild Awards including Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture. In addition, it received nine British Academy of Film and Television Arts nominations including Best Film and Outstanding British Film. Its cast and crew were honoured by LGBT civil rights advocacy and political lobbying organisation Human Rights Campaign for bringing Turing's legacy to a wider audience. As of January 2015, the film has grossed a total of $118.9 million worldwide against a $14 million production budget making it the top-grossing independent film release of 2014.