“The Way Back,” directed by Peter Weir, does a superb job of putting us in the footsteps of men walking thousands of miles to freedom. Because Weir is more interested in the physical challenges than the mental or emotional ones, we learn little of the main characters other than they are so driven by a desire for freedom that they’re willing to go to great extremes to attain it. His strong cast includes Ed Harris, Jim Sturgess, Colin Farrell and Saoirse Ronan. And we feel every frozen (and later burning) footstep across ice, snow and sand that traces a route from Siberia through the Gobi Desert and the Himalayas to finally India. The source novel is the 1956 bestseller The Long Walk by Slavomir Rawicz, which was originally published as a memoir but later discredited.
The movie opens with Janusz (Sturgess) being betrayed by his terrified wife, whose own freedom requires that she claim her husband is a spy. Janusz is shipped to Siberia where he joins a veritable United Nations of prisoners and is warned by the guards that the real prison is not the fences, guards and dogs, but the weather. But Janusz believes if he can get to the Mongolian border, he’ll be free. He’s joined by a tattooed Russian who’s gambler and criminal (Farrell), an American prisoner (Harris) and several others. Along the way they’re joined by a young girl (Ronan), who manages to cajole biographical details from her non-communicative traveling companions. The scenes of brute survival, scrounging for food, improvising shelter, making snow masks out of sheets of birch bark, are vivid. Unfortunately, the men are not. Since Weir was aware of the questionable validity of his source material, I find it curious that “The Way Back” still claims to be based on true events. 1/20/11
1 comment:
This is an excellent film......It has all the blood and guts and mud and frost bite and thirst that a movie could want along with some very good acting. It's just too bad that so few people will see it. Ed Harris deserves to be nominated for something along with the screenplay and makeup.Go see it if you can find it.
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