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The Choral
Movie

The Choral

2025 • Drama, History, Music

Woke Score
6
out of 10

Plot

A choral society's male members enlist in World War I, leaving the demanding Dr. Guthrie to recruit teenagers. Together, they experience the joy of singing while the young boys grapple with their impending conscription into the army.

Overall Series Review

The Choral is a historical drama set in a Yorkshire town during World War I, centered on a community's amateur choral society. As the men enlist, the demanding, atheist, and Germanophile Dr. Guthrie is hired to prepare the remaining members, which now include teenagers and women, for a performance of Elgar's 'The Dream of Gerontius.' The film aims to critique the jingoistic nationalism of the era and the class structure that sends young, working-class men to war. While celebrating the power of community and art, the narrative intentionally introduces characters that challenge the period's social norms, featuring a black soprano in the provincial choir, a gay choirmaster mourning his German naval officer lover, and a critique of the town's pious but narrow-minded church leadership. The emotional core relies on the personal struggles of young men facing conscription and the women grappling with loss and changing relationships. The film's primary focus is on how art can provide a spiritual and social refuge from the horrors and hypocrisies of war, often contrasting the moral integrity of the outsider protagonist with the bigotry and insularity of the established townsfolk.

Categorical Breakdown

Identity Politics7/10

The film deliberately incorporates characters whose identity is intended to disrupt the historical setting for the sake of 'diversity' and social commentary, notably the prominent role of a young Black woman in a 1916 provincial Yorkshire choir. The narrative contrasts the merit and talent of new recruits from diverse classes and a mixed-race background against the snobbery and jingoism of the established white, middle-class town leadership, placing 'whiteness' and the historical establishment in a critical light.

Oikophobia5/10

The hostility is not toward Western civilization entirely, but specifically toward the jingoistic nationalism, class-based corruption (the 'toffs sacrificing young futures'), and xenophobia of the home culture during WWI. The protagonist is framed as an honorable intellectual for his 'Germanophilia' and critique of the war. The film, however, simultaneously celebrates the positive attributes of the English working-class community and the high art of an English composer (Elgar), balancing the self-hatred with a positive view of community resilience.

Feminism3/10

The core plot is focused on the experiences of the male choirmaster, the male choir members, and the young boys facing conscription. The female characters, while important to the story, are largely defined by their relationships to the men who enlist, are wounded, or return. There is a strong female soprano character, but the overall structure does not promote a 'Girl Boss' trope, and one review notes the women largely 'exist in relationship to the men,' which resists the common feminist narrative framing.

LGBTQ+7/10

The main protagonist, Dr. Guthrie, is explicitly homosexual, a fact that is central to his character's conflict with the traditional town committee and the village clergyman, who 'prefer[s] a family man.' Guthrie's personal drama is driven by his grief over the loss of his lover, a German naval officer. The film places a non-normative sexuality at the heart of the narrative, presenting it as a source of moral and emotional complexity that is superior to the town’s repressed traditional morality.

Anti-Theism8/10

The protagonist, Dr. Guthrie, is presented as a brilliant and morally grounded atheist. The narrative pits him against the 'pious church members' and the clergyman, who are portrayed as bigoted, narrow-minded, and jingoistic obstacles to artistic and social progress. Religious figures and traditional faith are explicitly framed as a source of social consternation and prejudice, while the 'healing power of art' is promoted as the transcendent moral force, aligning with the negative framing of traditional religion and the elevation of a secular moral framework.