The Bridge on the River Kwai

What’s the Story?

The setting is Japan-occupied Siam (later Thailand) in 1943, after the Imperial Japanese Empire has conquered vast territories of Asia. Over a muddy jungle river called Kwai, a Japanese colonel, Saito (Sessue Hayakawa), must complete a railroad bridge vital to Japan's war effort. Into Saito's prison camp come captured British troops and their stalwart leader, Col. Nicholson (Alec Guinness). To Saito's confusion, Nicholson upholds British military traditions with his men, not at all taking defeat as a humiliation. Nicholson refuses to bow to Saito, and uses the bridge project to prove the superiority of the British and keep up the captives' morale. Meanwhile, escaped American soldier Shears (William Holden) is forced back to the Kwai compound to help advise a commando team assigned to destroy the bridge.

Is It Any Good?

Winner of seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture, THE BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI might be one of the finest war films of all time. Though based on a real-life WWII incident, the devastating story is really about what constitutes military duty and "honor" -- and how they can be twisted into disloyalty and dastardly treachery. While not explicitly bloody, there's a downbeat ending and a final one-word line of dialogue that sums up the whole thing: "Madness!"

There is an abundance of excitement (the last 20 minutes are excruciatingly tense), but well-acted minefields of issues and thoughtfulness are what make this a formidable arsenal. This is a war movie about ideas, not just blowing things up -- but in the end, both those attributes turn into the same thing, in an example of the usually noble concepts of battlefield chivalry and obedience taken to extremes.