It’s not the officious “chin up” part of Guinness’ character that struck me as off, but rather his complete buy-in on building a great bridge. Also, the claims in the movie that the PoWs were happier working extra hard, building a good bridge, than they would have been attempting to slow things down, sabotage it, and/or escape. Nothing I’ve read in non-fiction about WW2 gives me any basis to accept the supposed reaction of the PoWs (granted, we get that more from Guinness’ discussion of the PoWs than anything else, and theoretically, Guinness’ character could be deceiving himself about it).
To be fair, the pacing in 2001 was glacial even for the time. I’m one of those people who don’t have a problem with slow pacing, so it doesn’t bother me. Hell, one of the reasons I liked The Assassination Of Jesse James so much is because it took its sweet, sweet time.
Did you notice the power transfer between Guinness and the Camp Commander? It’s his, Guinness’, humiliation at being captured that drives his desire to make the best damn bridge they’ve ever seen - “Come on, Chaps! We’ll show these damn savages!” and by doing so, humiliate the Camp Commander. It’s all about power and masculinity. Years ahead of it’s time, in my opinion.
It’s like watching Badlands, realising what it’s actually about, and going “Holy fuxk! There wasn’t anything in the mainstream that even came close to this analysis. Maybe for another 20 years”.
Take as long as you want, Mr. Malick :o
If you’re using WW2 history as your reference point, then the Japanese camp leader should be the least believable character since he should have shot Guinness in the fifth minute to make an example of him.
Nicholson’s a charismatic leader who shamed the Japanese commander by staying in the box as long as he did. He’s his army’s reminder of their Britishness and their commander; if he says it’s OK, who’s a soldier to question? There’s an “authority and duty” motif throughout the film, from the schedule imposed on Saito to Holden’s resistance to the mission that only he can do.
One could argue, I suppose, that Guinness thinks they are better off keeping the commander they have instead of getting a new one with whom he has reach new accommodations, though there is little in the film to support this interpretation.
And yeah, I suspect there is a huge disparity between what Nicholson believes his troops are thinking and what they really are. The camp doctor protests, and Nicholson dismisses his worries. As I wrote above, the bridge starts as a means of discipline and then becomes a major part of his self-worth. There’s no reason that prisoners - who are being well treated and well fed because of the construction - might not make that same leap. Plus the whole manhood one-upmanship that metta notes above. Saito almost loses control of the project - bowing to Nicholson’s requests when timing gets tight - and in effect his command of the prisoners.
Troy
I wasn’t trying to say that it should be remade, 2001 remains one of my favorite films.
I was just making a joke.
There’s more than enough remakes going around.
Hmmm. I’d forgotten the book was written by Pierre Boulle, who also wrote Planet of the Apes.
I’d say that you should watch it again and see if it’s better the second time.
I enjoyed it more than LoA, but as I’ve gotten older, I can appreciate LoA a little more.
One of my favorite scenes is the very end when the guy who fired the fatal mortar round turns and faces his guides. I really thought Holden was going to pull it off and make it back to safety.
Come on, Phil, this is like reading Moby Dick and thinking, “Bullshit! There are no white whales, and if there were, nobody would chase one for so long.”
Trust me, the bridge is not just a bridge.
I’ll throw out a few lesser nitpicks about the movie:
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The American who escapes (Shears, played by William Holden), looks wrong physically. While most of the other PoW characters are thin, and some in the opening shots approach that emaciated look we associate with mistreated PoWs, Holden looks quite buff - as if he’d spent weeks ahead of the filming in the gym and drinking protein shakes (or whatever they did back in the 50s). It jumped out at me early in the film.
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There is some discontinuity with the river that bothered me. The first location, IIRC, looked like a mud flat. The fact that a Japanese engineer would have deemed that suitable instead of a narrows 400 yards downstream is hard to swallow. The fact that the river could sharply transition is also hard to swallow. At the end, they float a raft from upstream, through what appear to be very rocky rapids - there’s not much sign of those initial mud flats. (I could be remembering details wrong. Also, I think, but am not sure, that the position was moved 400 yards downstream. If it was upstream, that would mitigate this issue. Still, it seemed like the character of the river was changing too much, too fast.)
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The bridge itself seemed a bit too small in comparison to the labor force deployed and time involved. I estimated at the beginning of the movie that the British contingent was about 300 strong. The bridge had, I think, 2 main wooden piers. I understand that the whole British force wasn’t working on the bridge - some were working on the railroad. But building those two log piers, and the bridge deck itself, with, say, 150 men, does not seem like that major of an undertaking. If you look at some pictures of the bridge that apparently inspired the story, it looks much more epic.
Basically, all 3 of these can be summarized as ways in which the visuals felt a bit off. Again, I may be spoiled by more modern movies, which, aided by CG and probably other techniques, seem less prone to these issues. I’m viewing a 1957 movie through modern eyes.
BTW, I found a picture that I think is Holden in the movie. Does this guy look like he’s been in a PoW camp for an extended period of time?
You’re not the first person to have problems with it, for exactly the reasons you list. Here is Pauline Kael calling it “misshapen”, and at the wiki (looks like you found it) a former prisoner at the camp that inspired the movie said that, in real life, Nicholson would have been murdered by his own men.
In fairness, I’d read the Wikipedia comment from the former prisoner before I started this thread. It just sorta confirmed what I felt when I watched the movie - many of the characters’ actions just felt wrong/unrealistic.
To be fair, the pacing in 2001 was glacial even for the time.
Exactly. It’s totally outside of the mainstream of normal movie pacing and construction. Because there is always stuff going on visually, I’ve never found it dull. But it is very much a movie that marches to the beat of its own drummer.
I don’t think you can draw a clear trajectory of movie pacing over the years. Some old movies, particularly from the '30s and '40s, have a real “wham bam thank you ma’am” quality about them and waste very little time on atmosphere etc.
While it’s possible for slow pacing to be overdone and to make a movie dull, I generally think filmmakers today err the other way. One of the things I like about James Cameron, above almost any other action/sci-fi filmmaker of the age, is that he takes his goddamn sweet time putting his story elements in motion.
Part of what makes a movie read as “epic” to us, also, is that it takes its time. There is a roomy quality to certain movies, and there’s a pleasure to feeling that you are 90 minutes in and the story is only half-resolved. I recall feeling this particular pleasure very acutely as a child watching “Ben-Hur,” luxuriating in the length even. “The Godfather” has much the same feel; by the halfway point, when we first see Michael in Sicily, we have this wonderful sense that so much has happened yet so much more is still to come. That movie is never remotely dull because it is packed with so many distinctive characters and interesting moments, that even when the main plot is not moving forward, there’s stuff going on that absorbs us.
A good companion piece is King Rat, both the excellent film and James Clavell’s superb book.
Very true - did he regain lucidity at the end, or was it just an ironic coincidence that he fell on the detonator.
Put me in the camp of this is one of the best movies of all time.
How would you rate KR relative to his other books? I’m curious because I have a very strong love/hate relationship with Clavell’s work. I had no idea there was a good movie version of it. I need to get over the awful Rescue Dawn, and this might be just the ticket.
I’ll forever remember this movie because after teaching my grandfather how to use his new VCR many years ago he taped this movie when it aired on TV and mailed it to me. He used to complain every time he was at my parents house, usually holidays, of the crap we watched for movies. So he sent one for us to watch, this movie.
It is indeed a classic. Phil I think you’re holding it up under the microscope a bit too much. But hey, not every classic is a classic for everyone.
King Rat is pretty different than his other books, since it’s semi-autobiographical. It’s also very short compared to his other books - definitely worth reading, and a good companion piece to One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich in terms of prison camp live. Noble House has some character overlap with King Rat, although that’s largely incidental. The movie version of King Rat is relatively faithful to the book, but I don’t think it works great as a movie.
Interesting. I didn’t know any of that. I’ll have to check it out. I would derail further with the Clavell, but I know how testy people get about that. Thanks for the prompt response.
Weird, I just saw this the other week and instantly thought of “Kwai”.
Holden: you underestimate the awsomeness of “the greatest generation” .
Guiness: That’s “Sir” to you…plus he’s got a beer named after him. Obi-f-ing wan
As mentioned by Desslock, it is very different in terms of both scope and feel to the rest of the Asian saga. It’s the one I read first, incidentally, and the one I go back to the most. I am a huge fan of Shogun as well, but have only really bothered with Noble House and Tai-Pan once each, there is something about them that just feels too much like a slog. Whirlwind I have never read.
Both as part of the larger work, and as a separate novel, I cannot recommend King Rat highly enough. It doesn’t have the ‘here be an epic’ feel of some of the others, but definitely has a large impact, with some very well drawn characters. Really gives (I think) a feel for the desparation and the corruption that can spread through depravation. Unlike Dessie, I think the film works very well - I was lucky enough to catch it by accident before I had even read the book. It’s getting on a bit but I really didn’t think it showed - keep meaning to give it a second viewing to find out.