The Way Back

I had a real hard time writing a coherent review for this film. I kept circling a point but wasn't really able to clearly enunciate what I' was trying to say and ultimately just quit trying (which I guess might actually be appropriate). Just keep that in mind when you read this and feel thats its even more disjointed and badly written then usual.

The Way Back tells the story of three men who break out of a Siberian prison and walk to India. Actually six break out but they tell us right at the beginning that only three make it to India so you do spend a good chunk of the film trying to figure who dies, but that's not really the point. What's really amazing about the film is that director Peter Weir does his best to make sure its as subdued and unconventional as possible, and bends over backward to remove any sense of real tension or conventional payoff. For example he doesn't show the actual prison break, or how they sneak across the trans-siberian railroad into Mongolia, just cuts to after the fact like it wasn't that big of a deal. Additionally, the deaths are treated in as perfunctory manner as possible, and the avoidance of convention is so deliberate that when he shows a character running over a mountain and yelling "Water" it ends up being a muddy puddle. The film also has an incredibly spare score refusing to underline most moments with any kind of musical cue. Finally the character development is kept to a minimum as bits of backstory slip of over the course of the narrative but just enough to move the plot forward.

Anyway what you're left with is an mannered, slow developing, intentionally tension-less story about amazing endurance. There really aren't any lasting conflicts between the characters as they all just sort of settle into a resigned momentum that keeps them moving forward. I do really respect the effort to avoid convention, and try to get to the root of the story. In particular the approach means that you don't really stress out whether they're going to get caught or not, or whether they'll even be that successful. Rather you just sit back and view the spectacle of walking through brutal conditions. This approach does yield some nice moments, and definitely made me appreciate the enormity of the quest. Thaaaaat said, I don't think it completely works. While I don't necessarily miss the traditional beats of this kind of film I do think there needs to be a bit more narrative momentum, and character development, to give the viewer something more to hold on to. While I think that the film does a good job capturing the drudgery of endless walking (having run an ultra marathon I can in a very tiny manner relate) it doesn't necessarily make for the most compelling viewing. As the film runs over two hours I do think there is room for tightening, and several portions where it could have easily picked up its languid pace.

However (and man is this turning into an equivocating review), the fact that I wasn't completely bored by the entire proceedings is a testament to how well the film is made. There is definitely a meditative quality to certain sections, and most moments on their own are impressive. That may ultimately be the films downfall. It has a lot of interesting pieces, but they don't necessarily cohere. It often ends up feeling episodic, and the desire to avoid convention means they skip over a lot of details that would have help pull the whole thing together. I give director Weir credit for not hollywoodizing everything, but ultimately I just wasn't able to get fully involved by what should have been an amazing story.