I had the opportunity to watch Pressure at an early screening in New York followed by a Q&A with Andrew Scott and Brendan Fraser. And now that I have properly gathered my thoughts (and notes!) from the evening, here is my full review. You can also get the scoop and see photos from the New York premiere here.
Pressure tells the story of a real-life man many of us probably had never even heard of before this film.
Ask people to name famous World War II figures and they will probably say Eisenhower. Montgomery. Patton. MacArthur.
But James Stagg?
A Scottish meteorologist helping decide whether D-Day should go ahead?
Probably not.
Pressure puts Stagg at the center of one of the biggest decisions in modern history. And rightly so. Because while generals planned the invasion and armies prepared for war, someone still had to answer one terrifying question:
What if the weather is not right?
The title Pressure works in more than one way here. James Stagg studies air pressure, storms, tides, and weather systems. But he is also under another kind of pressure entirely — the heavy responsibility of making a recommendation that could change the course of the war, and the world, forever.
By now, I am sure many of you have already read the excellent reviews from movie critics. And while I am writing a full review of Pressure, I also want to focus more on Damian Lewis’ performance as General Bernard Law “Monty” Montgomery than many mainstream reviews naturally will. Because this is a role many of us have been excited about ever since Damian was cast in it.
But before getting to Damian’s Montgomery, I think it is important to first talk a little about the film itself and the impossible situation at the center of it.
Damian’s answer, when asked at the New York premiere to describe Pressure in three words, may be the perfect description of the movie.
“Suspenseful, intense, and wet.”
🙂
As I watched Pressure, I realized more and more that this is not just a war movie. It is a movie about responsibility. About fear. About uncertainty. And about people having to make enormous decisions without ever knowing for sure if they are right.
Well… maybe except for Monty. But we’ll get there a bit later 🙂
At the center of the story is James Stagg, played by Andrew Scott, the Scottish meteorologist brought in to help advise Eisenhower about whether the Normandy invasion should go ahead despite terrible weather conditions moving across the Channel.
But the film is not really about weather.
It is about leadership under pressure.
One of the things Pressure does especially well is show that Stagg is not simply “the weather guy.”
He is a scientist.
Stagg is honestly a bit of a nerd. He is deeply devoted to meteorology and absolutely committed to evidence, data, and science.
Andrew Scott plays Stagg as someone who is not trying to charm the room. Stagg cares about getting the forecast right, and not about being liked. And during the Q&A after the screening, Scott said something really interesting about the difference between a “nice” person and a “good” person. A nice person tells people what they want to hear. A good person tells people what they need to hear.
And that is exactly who Stagg is in this movie. He is willing to stand in front of some of the most powerful military leaders of World War II and tell them something they absolutely do not want to hear: the weather is dangerous, the storms are real, and nature does not care about their largest seaborne invasion in history.
Stagg believes in data. He believes in science. He wants weather reports from every base within 2,000 miles of Normandy in order to build the clearest possible forecast.
And importantly, he also understands the limits of science.
Northern Europe has notoriously unpredictable weather, and Stagg knows that anything beyond 24 hours becomes increasingly uncertain. While Colonel Krick relies heavily on historical weather patterns and predicts clear skies for June 5, Stagg’s forecast is grim: high winds, rough waves, and terrible visibility.
People keep demanding certainty from Stagg. But he can’t give them that. One can be confident to a certain extent, but can never truly be sure. And that uncertainty slowly pushes everyone in the room toward breaking point. We hear Montgomery saying Stagg has lost his mind.
The conflict between Stagg and Krick becomes one of the most fascinating parts of the movie because it is not simply a disagreement between two men. It is a clash between two completely different approaches to knowledge, prediction, and risk.
The film also does a wonderful job showing the scientific methods behind forecasting in 1944. There are no satellites. No modern computer models. No instant global systems. Forecasts are built through observation, reports, calculations, and instinct.
The weather balloon scenes are especially striking. They send balloons high into the atmosphere to collect information about air pressure, wind, and storm systems. When the balloons burst high above the ground, it almost feels symbolic of the pressure building inside the men themselves.
You can prepare armies.
You can prepare ships.
You can prepare planes.
But how do you fight the weather?
And that question becomes the emotional center of the film.
Brendan Fraser gives Eisenhower real emotional vulnerability throughout the movie.
One of the most interesting things I learned during the Q&A after the screening was that Eisenhower had never actually fired a shot in battle himself and had never been shot at either — something Montgomery repeatedly brings up in his own way throughout the film as he stresses his own battlefield experience and sense of military urgency.
And yet Ike is the man carrying the responsibility for the entire operation.
The movie also makes clear how deeply Exercise Tiger still haunts him. Exercise Tiger — the disastrous D-Day rehearsal operation that ended with hundreds of American deaths — is not simply background history here. It hangs over Eisenhower emotionally throughout the film.
Brendan Fraser explained during the Q&A that Exercise Tiger was largely absent from history books for a long time, which makes its inclusion here feel even more important.
You can see how desperate Eisenhower becomes as tensions rise between the meteorologists. He wants certainty. He wants someone to tell him the right answer. But nobody can. And that is exactly what makes the movie so intense.
There is also a beautiful scene I do not want to spoil too much involving the storm finally arriving on Sunday. It is one of the moments where the film really drives home the force of nature hanging over every decision in that room.
And then into that uncertainty walks Montgomery.
Certain. Impatient. Ready to move.
Bernard Law Montgomery — “Monty” — remains one of the most famous and controversial British commanders of World War II.
Some admired him. Others found him unbearable.
He was disciplined, confident, emotionally reserved, and absolutely convinced of his own judgement.
Winston Churchill once described him:
“In defeat, unbeatable; in victory, unbearable.”
And Damian Lewis turns out to be excellent casting for exactly that reason.
Damian has always been very good at playing men in positions of authority — men who can calm a room while also making everyone slightly nervous at the same time. From Major Richard Winters in Band of Brothers, to Bobby Axelrod in Billions, to Henry VIII in Wolf Hall, Damian understands how to play powerful men whose confidence becomes part of the atmosphere around them.
And that quality becomes central to his Montgomery. If Eisenhower represents moral burden, and if Stagg represents science, then Montgomery represents urgency.
Monty believes his men are ready. He knows the Germans are strengthening their defenses every day. The clock is ticking against them.
And Damian Lewis plays him with exactly the kind of forceful certainty that makes Montgomery both compelling and incredibly frustrating at the same time.
Montgomery constantly reminds the room that he has been to war. Unlike Eisenhower, he has battlefield experience, and he makes sure everyone knows it 🙂 He does not want years of planning and preparation to be wasted while the Germans continue reinforcing the beaches. So where Stagg looks at the sky, and Eisenhower looks at the consequences, Montgomery looks at the clock.
For Monty, time is the enemy.
One of the smartest things Damian does is avoid turning Montgomery into a caricature. There is certainly a very large ego there, and confidence, too. But he also plays Monty as someone carrying the pressure of sending men into battle. He just expresses that pressure very differently from Eisenhower.
Damian also gives Montgomery a sharp edge of impatience throughout the film. You can feel that Monty believes everyone else in the room is overcomplicating things while time slips away. Even when sitting quietly, Damian plays him like a man already mentally moving troops across the Channel.
And yet what makes the film so interesting is that Monty’s confidence also blinds him in certain ways. At one point he insists that the weather is irrelevant. But of course the movie itself makes clear that the weather is absolutely not irrelevant. You can have the best ships and best planes, and best-trained soldiers. But if the weather does not cooperate, how do you even get the men onto the beaches?
That is where Stagg becomes essential.
Monty wants the green light because he believes his soldiers are ready for “the big match.” Get them onto the beaches somehow, anyhow, and they will win. But Stagg understands that nature may stop them before they even arrive.
And that clash between military certainty and scientific uncertainty becomes one of the strongest ideas in the movie. I love it!
The turning point comes when Stagg finally detects a narrow gap between the storms — a few critical hours where an invasion might actually be possible. It is not safe or perfect. But possible. And when he tells Eisenhower that D-Day is a go, the decision feels enormous.
There is also something really interesting about seeing Damian return to a World War II story from the opposite end of the chain of command.
As Montgomery, he steps into a completely different kind of leadership role from Dick Winters in Band of Brothers: certainty, authority, pressure, and an unshakable belief in being right.
And yet one of Damian’s greatest strengths as an actor remains the same.
Stillness.
Even when Montgomery is not speaking, Damian makes you feel his presence in the room. There is a controlled intensity to his performance, you feel that Monty is constantly pushing forward, even while standing completely still.
At the Pressure premiere, director Anthony Maras described him perfectly:
“Damian. He’s thunder… and a bit of lightning, too.”
And that is exactly what Damian brings to Montgomery in this movie: quiet power ready to explode.
Every time Montgomery appears on the screen, the tension rises. And that very tension, or pressure if you will, is really what the film is about.
Kerry Condon also gives a strong performance as Kay Summersby, who often feels like an emotional bridge between Eisenhower and Stagg as tensions inside the room continue to rise. While the movie stays focused on the larger military and scientific pressures surrounding D-Day, Condon brings warmth and humanity into some of the film’s most emotionally charged moments.
And the entire ensemble works beautifully together. Nobody feels out of place. The movie succeeds because every actor fully commits to the tension, urgency, and uncertainty hanging over that room.
I have to add that the cinematography is also extremely impressive. One of the things Pressure does especially well is blend real historical footage with the film’s own scenes so seamlessly that at times the line between archive and dramatization almost disappears.
Pressure never gives the audience the comfort of certainty. Even though we all know how the story ends, we still find ourselves sitting at the edge of our seats. And if that is not a success for everyone behind and in front of the camera, I don’t know what is.
What also makes the story feel surprisingly modern is how strongly it speaks to the importance of science, expertise, and evidence-based decision-making.
Stagg is not asking people to trust instincts or wishful thinking. He is asking them to respect data, evidence, and uncomfortable truths — even when those truths are inconvenient.
And that idea still feels incredibly relevant today.
Because in the end, the success of D-Day depended not only on military strength or battlefield experience, but also on people willing to listen to science, expertise, and difficult facts. There is also a wonderful historical line referenced after the screening: Eisenhower, when JFK asks him about what gave him the edge on D-Day, responds:
“We had better meteorologists than the Germans.”
And as the ships move toward Utah Beach and the paratroopers begin their jumps into Normandy, longtime Band of Brothers fans may find themselves thinking about Easy Company — and about Dick Winters himself.
Which makes the reunion between Andrew Scott and Damian Lewis here feel even more special.
Hall and Winters once jumped into the war together.
Now Stagg and Montgomery are helping decide when that war begins.
Excellent writing, as usual! I’m going to see the film tomorrow.
Thank you so much for your kind words, Fay! Pressure is a real good movie. Damian shines every time he appears on the screen. And Andrew Scott is brilliant as James Stagg. I’m impressed by the performances all around.
Excellent review! Your thoughts are insightful. Thank you for allowing us to read it
Thank you so much for your kind words, Lily… you’ve made my day! This blog is my sanctuary and writing makes me VERY happy!