Bridge on the River Kwai – 10 out of 10

Bridge on the River Kwai – 10 out of 10 PhilosoGuys

David Lean’s masterpiece about a Japanese Prison Camp in Thailand and the construction of the Burmese Railroad over the Kwai River is as magnificent and important today as it was over 50 years ago. The acting is some of the best this author has ever seen: Sir Alec Guinness’ role as the commanding officer of the British Prisoners is epic. From the first march into the camp, through the torturous days spent in “the oven,” while he takes control of the camp’s bridge construction, and ending in the stunning final scene, Guinness is able to maintain complete believability while embodying the inhumanly stubborn spirit of industriousness of the British Empire. William Holden, the sneaky American caught in between two warring empires, Jack Hawkins, the brilliant British saboteur, and Sessue Hayakawa, the brutal yet pathetic Japanese prison camp commandant, all provide a level of acting depth that is rarely accomplished in most films.

Bridge is also remembered for its multimillion dollar budget that incorporated the construction and destruction of a bridge and the wrecking of a real train. Today, we take this for granted with all the CGI that dominates the big screen. But the large numbers of extras, the construction of a prison camp and the beautiful, on-sight filming of the movie are ten times more magnificent than anything generated in a computer. This kind of movie is a dead breed.

But beyond the superb acting and grandiose scenes, what is just so great about Bridge on the River Kwai? What is oft forgotten in today’s plethora of rip-off films is its stunning originality. Kwai discusses the crisis of the prisoner in wartime, but also of the human need for civilization. On the surface, British soldiers are confronted with the harsh reality of a Japanese prison camp, where the Geneva Convention is largely ignored because Japanese customs are at odds with it. How many of these kinds of POW movies have we seen in our lifetimes? On a deeper level, the true crisis of the film is Guinness’ leadership of the bridge project, which he takes on with zeal and diligence. He is proving to everyone just how great the Brits are, from organization to engineering. The only catch is that the bridge will serve as a supply line to the Japanese offensives against the British forces in India. His blind pursuit and adherence to his European roots, whether it is for the mental health of his troops or his own personal vendetta against the Japanese, leads to a great harm. This is only undone with great sacrifice in the final scene, which illuminates the absurdities of war and questions the roles of civilization and individuality in life: Are they true perspectives or ways of blinding ourselves from darkness.

With all this said and done, it appears that the movie works within the framework of Heart of Darkness . A civilized man is sent into the jungles, to uncivilized people, and slowly, through the mutation of his beliefs and convictions, he is overcome by the primordial monster and left unrecognizable and without morality. Though, in Bridge on the River Kwai, Guinness is released from the hold of barbarism and detonates the explosives on the bridge with his dying body.

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