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Directed By
David Lean
Written By:
Carl Foreman, Michael Wilson
Cast:
William Holden, Alec Guinness, Jack Hawkins, Sessue Hayakawa, James Donald, Geoffrey Horne, André Morell, Percy Herbert, Peter Williams, Harold Goodwin, John Boxer, Ann Sears, John Boxer, Henry Okawa, Keiichiro Katsumoto, M.R.B. Chakrabandhu
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Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
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The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) is a spectacular film and a sobering reminder of that generation who sacrificed much to provide a future of liberties and values that we should uphold and never take lightly.
Although this film is largely fictional, it dramatizes the WWII story of those prisoners of war who were forced to build the Thailand-Burma Railway in 1943. Beautifully filmed, expertly crafted, and amazingly delivered as many of his films like Doctor Zhivago (1965) and Lawrence of Arabia (1962), I think this movie is David Lean's lifetime masterpiece.
Filmed in Sri Lanka, the bridge on the set was built in 8 months, using 500 workers and more than 30 elephants, at a height of 50 feet above water and 425 feet long. The real bridge near Kanchanaburi, Thailand, is a different bridge than that seen in the movie. The original bridge was built over several months starting in October 1942 by slave labor civilians and POWs as part of the "Death Railway" to transport Japanese troops between Rangoon and Burma. Constructed of steel and concrete, the bridge was not destroyed as noted in the movie but remains today as a usable bridge and tourist attraction. This actual railway was 415 kilometers long and carved out of the jungle in just 16 months, a task calculated by expert engineers to take five years. The total labor force consisted of about 68,000 Allied POWs and 200,000 captured Asian laborers. To complete this engineering endeavor, the combined death toll was around 96,000 of which 18,000 were Allied POWs.
Historical inaccuracies aside, this movie defines the term film epic on a grand scale from the original sets to the notable cast. Alec Guinness deservedly received the Oscar for Best Actor in his role of Colonel Nicholson who he entirely embodies. He seems to disappear so utterly into the character that the acting seems forgotten leaving nothing but the real man. This is a superlative piece of acting from one of the truly great actors of all times. William Holden as well delivers a remarkable performance as Commander Shears, capturing that somewhat embittered sarcasm and resignation of a man trapped by circumstances beyond his control who does what he can to make the most of it while waiting for any opportunity of escape. Holden's work here is Award-worthy, but was destined to forever remain in the shadows of Alec Guinness's definitive performance. Regardless, it is a pleasure to enjoy performances of this caliber in a single film. Other notables include Sessue Hayakawa who is entirely convincing as the tormented Colonel Saito and Jack Hawkins as demolition expert Major Warden and the absolute perfect personification of the undaunted British determination.
The Japanese occupation was one of the most brutal in human history. Victor Davis Hanson, a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, reported that 250,000 people were dying monthly as a result of starvation, disease and other brutalities forced on civilian populations by the Japanese. In fact, he documents they killed between 10 and 15 million Chinese during the war alone.
Despite such historical tragedy, today Hollywood is producing films that focus only on the anguish of our then enemies. One recent example is Fog of War (2003). Through the eleven lessons from the life of Robert S. McNamara, this movie focuses only on the suffering of the Japanese as it builds the case that they were the victims. Its treatment of the actual facts is grossly immoral. Never once does this film even mention how thousands of civilians and great numbers of soldiers were dying every month in Japanese occupied Southeast Asia. Stopping the war quickly was the most humanitarian thing that America could have done.
Some American anti-military types in general and many Hollywooders in particular — beneficiaries of more than 60 years of freedom, peace, and prosperity achieved through sacrifices to defeat fascism and Communism — tells us that Iwo Jima was unnecessary, if not a racist campaign; that Hiroshima had little military value but instead was a strategic ploy to impress Stalin; and that the Americans were undisciplined, racist who relied only on financial and material values. I wonder if Mr. McNamara and other "revisionists" ever asked whether they could have written their books, spoke their words or made their movies so freely under the Third Reich, Mussolini's Italy, Tojo's Japan, Stalin's Russia, Communist Eastern Europe — or today in such egalitarian utopias as China, Iran, Cuba, North Korea, or Venezuela?
While this epic film is undoubtedly a great movie, it sanitizes the crimes the Japanese committed against the Allied POWs and Asian captives held during that time in the region. In summary, this film is an excellent historical reminder and a timeless work of art. The Exclusive Limited Edition is an example of doing a DVD right for such a great classic. I congratulate Columbia for a fantastic job!
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 | Dimitra
Jan 10, 2009 1:54 PM
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| Finally someone who has the courage to tell it like it is! I applaud you! |
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