It's the height of World War II, and Hitler has invaded Czechoslovakia and put in charge his third in command, a ruthless dictator in his own right named Reinhard Heydrich. As the occupying leader, he is the architect of something called the Final Solution - an ultimate plan to wipe out the Jewish population from the face of the earth. In order to end the Final Solution as well as the general reign of terror in Czechoslovakia, a handful of Czech and Slovak soldiers conspire with the government to assassinate Heydrich. They called this plan: Operation Anthropoid.
I'm sure there's quite a few people who might be tired of seeing movies based on the time period of both World Wars, if only (probably) for the reason that they are all beginning to seem to look and feel the same. Where most war movies focus a bit too much on the action and not terribly much on the drama and suspense, Anthropoid does the exact opposite. It focuses almost entirely on the planning and secrecy surrounding the plot to kill Reinhard Heydrich, and only in the third act does the audience see the plan go into fruition. Personally, I loved that. I love war movies in general, but every once in awhile it's nice to see one that doesn't completely rely on extravagantly cool visuals during the war scenes. I could feel the tension in the air when it seemed the conspirators were going to be caught, the thrill of excitement when it finally all came together. One of my favorite actors, Cillian Murphy, did well as one of the main characters named Josef Gabcik. Jamie Dornan, a.k.a. Mr. Christian Grey, did pretty well as Josef's partner Jan Kubis during the assassination plot. Charlotte Le Bon - whom I last saw in The Hundred Foot Journey - and Anna Geislerová were wonderful as the two women who Josef Gabcik and Jan Kubis meet up with and ask for help in their assassination plot. Not to mention, but from some of the things I've read, real life locations in Prague were used to invoke a natural feel to the film as opposed to creating the sets in a studio.
There's very little I'd consider negative. There were a couple of places where the accents were so thick that it was a bit difficult to understand what was being said, but I could still follow what was going on onscreen, so it wasn't a huge deal. It's also rated R, and a war movie at that, so I would not recommend parents take their young kids to see it.
For World War II history buffs and war movie lovers, I would wholeheartedly recommend seeing Anthropoid. It's a great historically based film that shows a different side to World War II than what is typically shown. To me, that makes it even better.
