I became a fan of director Peter Weir years ago after seeing The Year of Living Dangerously - a terrific film made in the glorious days before Mel Gibson had lost his mind. Weir has an amazing ability to make you feel like you are inside a movie. I also loved his films Green Card and Witness.
Weir takes you into a world and compels you to stay there.
The Way Back is a different sort of movie, and yet it's not. There's no romance. It starts out in Poland in 1940, surely a harrowing time. A young man is sent to a Soviet prison in Siberia, for political prisoners. There he meets Ed Harris and Colin Farrell and various other assorted folks. Weir draws you into that world brilliantly, with a look, a tiny gesture, a tidbit of dialogue. (As I was watching those prison scenes, I kept thinking wow, it's cold in here. Ironic, since I live with my mom and we keep the air downstairs on 78-80 all summer.)
I must confess right now, Ed Harris is one of my all-time fave actors. He is amazing. I would sit in a theater and watch him read the newspaper for two hours, even if he only read 2 articles aloud! He would NOT be boring!
If Ed were not already married I would have to track him down one day and ask him to go out to dinner. Even with a goofy bow tie on he's adorable.
Anyway, I digressed.
Ed, Colin, and particularly Jim Sturges, are compelling to watch. The men escape and walk across Siberia, eventually getting to Mongolia, and China, and finally into India. I was able to discuss Russian geography, Chinese politics, and several other interesting factoids with my son, who was captivated by the movie.
Since I have been to Siberia and Kazakhstan, the movie was particularly riveting to me. Now, as in the early 1940's, that part of the world has vast stretches that are completely uninhabited. No roads. No phones, No villages for hundreds of miles. I spent a day in 2004 flying over it in a rickety old plane, looking down, and you go for HOURS without seeing so much as a telephone pole. It's truly the back end of nowhere. I cannot imagine trying to walk through there.
You should see The Way Back. The story is told without sentimentality, and yet by the end of the movie you care about the characters as much as they care about each other. It's another incredible journey into a different world, courtesy of Peter Weir. Brilliant movie.
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