For all the awful history it delves into, the picture has difficulty in feeling much about it.Īnd perhaps more curiously, there is a shocking lack of conflict between Eric and his wife, Patti. Certainly, both Eric and Patti feel angry, hurt, astonished and more, but the movie itself is void of that kind of sentiment. For all the assuredness behind the camera and in front of it, there’s very little in way of edge or even, surprisingly, emotion. Instead, they provide a framework for the fear Eric still lives with, and the context to understand how everything that happened could break him spiritually, a horror worse than any physical harm that came to him.Ĭertainly, this is all dealt with by everyone involved with the utmost respect and seriousness toward the subject matter, but that also makes “The Railway Man” somewhat safe. If you don’t know the true story, or haven’t read the full synopsis, we won’t give up too much of the third act but essentially, the picture leans toward-but doesn’t quite fully embrace-a will-he-or-won’t-he thriller-type scenario. Divided between past and “present” (which in the film is the early 1980s), Teplitzky spends a considerable time on flashbacks detailing Eric’s experiences at the hands of the Japanese, and it’s certainly every bit as hard to watch as you might think. And when Patti is finally given the full picture by Finlay, she helps Eric confront his past directly, so they can try and have a future together. As a result, he goes through nothing short of unimaginable torture, with the bulk of it coming from one particularly sadistic guard. But when that radio is discovered, Eric steps up to the be fall guy, saving his fellow soldiers from harsh beatings or worse. But they continued to resist in small ways, and managed to build a crude radio so they could get any news they could of the war raging around the globe. Under conditions so harsh that the project was nicknamed the Death Railway, Eric and his fellow soldiers did their best to withstand a grueling, punishing and nearly unlivable situation. ![]() She learns that Eric was part of a contingent of British soldiers, working as POWs for the Japanese, who were forced to build the Thailand-Burma Railway. Knowing there is a good man trapped in the cage of memories he can’t work his way out of, Patti reaches out to Eric’s friend Exposition Device Finlay ( Stellan Skarsgård) who reluctantly, and then openly, gives her the background she so desperately needs. The Best International Series on Netflix to Watch Right Nowġ5 Other Great Modern Westerns to Watch Beyond 'The Power of the Dog' ![]() 'Dreaming Walls' Review: The Walls Don't Talk in This Vague Chelsea Hotel Documentary 'Persuasion' Review: An Effervescent Dakota Johnson Gives Jane Austen Drama a Cheeky Retelling ![]() And he’s certainly not willing to share what he’s going through, not even with his own wife. It can’t be predicted when they’ll arrive, but when they do, it leaves him crippled on the floor, writhing in mental agony in what is an all-too-real and palpable head trip into a past he would simply like to forget. It isn’t long until Eric’s troubles (what we’d now call post-traumatic stress disorder) rear their ugly head. With Eric and Patti swiftly married not very long after first meeting, the middle-aged couple happily settle into domesticity, or so it seems. And certainly, the seriousness of this story doesn’t need any stylistic ornamentation. During World War II he was captured by the Japanese and sent to a work camp where he and his fellow prisoners were forced to survive the torture inflicted on them by their captors in extreme conditions.Aside from the opening, “The Railway Man,” as directed by Jonathan Teplitzky, doesn’t stray too far from the conventional in telling what turns out to be a harrowing story of survival and courage in the face of unspeakable brutality. The true story of Eric Lomax, a British officer fascinated with railways since childhood.
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