365+ movies in 365 Days: Day 138 - The Bridge On The River Kwai

I have said it before and I'll say it again, movies are meant to be seen on a big screen with an audience. They are a communal experience and enjoyment of the film is increased when seen with a large group in a theatre.

Today I saw a restored print of the 1957 Academy Award winning film The Bridge On The River Kwai. I have seen this movie many times. The first time was on TV when I was a 7 or 8 years old. I have owned the film in in three different home video formats and I have probably watched it about 10 times in my life. But watching on a big screen was like seeing it for the first time; the colors and details were so intense.

It's an epic, bigger than life movie and it needs to be seen on a big screen. The performances are perfect, particularly Alec Guinness as Colonel Nicholson. His battle of wills with Colonel Saito (Sessue Hayakawa) is one of the best two character conflicts put on film. Guinness won his only Best Actor Oscar for the role. The film is essentially divided into two parts. The first is the dual of character between Nicholson and Saito; the second an espionage mission to destroy the bridge and cut off the Japanese supply lines. William Holden as navy Commander Shears joins the two halves together. He is in the POW camp when Colonel Nicholson and his troops arrive whistling the Colonel Bogey March. He manges to escape and make his way to a military hospital in Ceylon. There he is recruited by gung-ho Major Warden (Jack Hawkins) to lead the commando raid to blow up the bridge.

The film's ending is classic and the theatre was dead silent for the last 20 minutes as the tension built. During the climatic fight I heard an audience member whisper loudly, "kill him, kill him" as they got caught up in the story. When the film ended the audience clapped. How often does that happen?

The movie was nominated for eight Academy Awards and won seven: Picture, Director, Best Actor, Writing, Editing, Music and Cinematography. Sessue Hayakawa was nominated for Best Supporting Actor, but lost to Red Buttons for Sayornara. The original writing award went to Pierre Boulle; who was the only writer listed on the credits; and who wrote the original novel. If you look on the posters you will see he is the only writer listed. It was later revealed that two other writes, Carl Foreman and Micheal Wilson actually wrote the screenplay, but they had been blacklisted. In the restored version of the film their names were added to the credits and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences belatedly awarded them Oscars for their work.

Original Movie Poster from 1957

Poster for restoration with writer's credits added.

The Colonel Bogey March is permanently associated with this movie. One can't help whistling the tune after seeing the movie. In fact a few audiences members were whistling during the movies marching scene.

Before this movie David Lean made mostly smaller pictures in the studio. Summertime with Katherine Hepburn was his first film on location. The Bridge On The River Kwai would define him as a maker of epics and he would go on to film Lawrence Of Arabia, Doctor Zhivago, Ryan's Daughter and A Passage To India.

The film was also responsible for starting a trend of epic war thrillers. The Bridge On the River Kwai was followed by The Guns Of Navarone, The Great Escape, Operation Crossbow, The Dirty Dozen and Where Eagles Dare; among others.

The theatre was quite crowded and afterwards I over heard comments in the lobby that made me realize that this movie is unfamiliar to many people. I took a moment to think about it and I realized that the film itself is 53 years old. That means that generation x; and generation y; and generation whatever; have grown up without the film being part of their lives. The networks don't show movies like this anymore. They are the sole province of Turner Classic Movies and the video rental store. In addition war movies and old-fashioned epics have gone out of style. I also imagine that most younger people don't know who William Holden is, or Jack Hawkins; and if they know Alec Guinness its as Obi-Wan-Kenobi from Star Wars. I don't think a younger audience would seek this film out unless they are major film buffs. That is why it is so important that revival house like The Castro Theatre, The Stanford Theatre and other revival houses keep showing these pictures and making them accessible to today's audiences.

At the Movie House rating **** stars. Classic American Film