The Great War (World War I) is often overshadowed by World
War II. What’s forgotten is not just the legacy and sacrifices of European
soldiers, but also the struggles of multi-ethnic laborers and troops (from
India, South East Asia, and Africa). Perhaps it is so because the Great War
didn’t have a clearly drawn distinction between good and evil, compared to the
easily detestable figures of Hitler and Mussolini in World War II. Or may be
the death toll statistics (37 million + vs 56 million +) makes us highlight the
squalor and inhumanity of one over the other. With four years of brutal trench
warfare and use of deadly chemical warfare agent, the destruction and horror
World War I brought upon human race was unprecedented. And from a cinematic
perspective, the conflict of The Great War is harder to tackle or make it work
in dramatic ways, although there have been numerous painstakingly detailed
literature and personal accounts. R.C. Sheriff’s 1928 play Journey’s End is one
of the classic works of WWI literature, which depicts the daily routines of a
platoon of British Soldiers stationed on the horrendous Western Front as they
wait for an impending German assault.
Sheriff’s play was well renowned in its time which was first
performed in London with Laurence Olivier in the cast. A film version was also
made by James Whale in 1930 (shortly before he made his classic work
‘Frankenstein’). Saul Dibb (The Duchess, Suite Francaise) has now brought it
back to the big screen for the first time in nearly 90 years. Furthermore it’s
a well-crafted adaption that (working from a script by Simon Reade), if not a
masterpiece, at least deserves a place in the list of hard-hitting movies tackling
the subject of trench warfare. Starting from Abel Gance’s ‘I Accuse’ (1919;
which he remade it in 1938), Lewis Milestone’s ‘All Quiet on the Western Front’
(1930) to Stanley Kubrick’s ‘Paths of Glory’ (1957) and Peter Weir’s ‘Gallipoli’
(1981), the cinematic trenches and dugouts have powerfully told the tales of
suffering and undying human spirit. Although it’s been nearly a centennial
since the events depicted in Journey’s End occurred, the wounds not simmering
and raw, its immersive vision of young and old generations of men caught in the
purgatorial landscape deeply conveys the human costs of war, unlike any informational type videos and detailed wikipedia articles.
Journey’s End follows soldiers preparing for battle. It’s a
study of their pervasive sense of dread that always soaring in the
claustrophobic, rat-infested hell-hole. The narrative focuses on imparting a
lived-in experience to the viewers rather than displaying the thrill of battle.
It’s very low on bloodletting and there are no images of mutilated, limbless
bodies. The sheer unpleasantness confronted in Journey’s End is purely
psychological. It’s a compilation of deeply felt exchanges between men who know
they are going to die soon; not simply die, but eviscerated by machine guns and
shells. That could have been easily turned into a cliché, or the script simply
may have failed to elevate the material from its theatrical roots to cinematic
medium. But thanks to the tremendous casting and performances, the film rarely
seems stagey or boxed-in.
Journey’s End opens few days before what would be later
known as ‘Spring Offensive’, the last push by the German to emerge victorious,
which of course failed and cost the lives of 800,000 men on both sides. In
March 1918, the members of C Company, led by young Captain Stanhope (Sam Claflin), marched into a muddy trench, somewhere in Northern France. They are to wait
there for six days, and if no German offensive takes place another Company
would take their place. But the intelligence says the enemy's advance is coming
very soon. The handsome but broken Stanhope had been tirelessly working from
the beginning of war to protect his men and represses his PTSD symptoms with
whisky. He flies into rage over every little thing. However, Stanhope is often
assuaged by the presence of his second-in-command, Lieutenant Osborne (Paul Bettany), a former schoolteacher, who maintains his grace even amidst the
squalidness and terror. The men belovedly address him as ‘Uncle’.
Fresh-faced officer James Raleigh (Asa Butterfield) who is
eager to get into the action gets himself assigned to the C Company. He is also
friends with Stanhope, whose sweetheart is Raleigh’s elder sister. He is
dashing and wants to savor the ‘spectacle’ of battlefield. But he is harshly
brought back to earth after witnessing Stanhope’s gradual mental breakdown.
Stanhope largely ignores Raleigh, fearing that Raleigh’s sister will know about
his sorry state. Rounding up this company’s officer crew are the cheery and
resolute Trotter (Stephan Graham) and shell-shocked, mentally-afflicted Hibbert
(Tom Sturridge). Another pivotal member occupying the officer quarters in the
trenches is docile cook Mason (Toby Jones). The deadline of German attack is fast
dwindling. And these soldiers like cancer-ridden patients at a hospice wait for the
inevitable; some with a steely nerve and some with a barely concealed rage.
Journey’s End is easily director Saul Dibb’s career best
work and far great than his previous cloying war drama 'Suite Francaise' (2014).
Raede’s impressive script and Dibb’s visual acuity never makes the action feel
stagy, although it mostly takes place inside a single setting. The eventual daylight raid in
the play allows Raede to sharply illustrate the nonchalance of the officer
class members of the army. When the old Patrician General asks Captain Stanhope
to finish the raid before it gets dark and says he wants the results before in
time for dinner, the fury kindled within us doesn’t associate wickedness only with
the 'foreign' enemy. Even though Sheriff’s play doesn’t include a prominent
private soldier character, the whole atmosphere of paranoia and anxiety sadly
notes the imminent senseless slaughter of the common soldiers (not just
British; even the captured German private remains antsy). Films like Hacksaw
Ridge (2016), in attempting to portray the senseless deaths in the battlefield
somehow turned the same into a spectacle (with its video-game violence). But Journey’s
End purely conveys the psychological unrest of wandering through the mud-squelching
trenches. The de-saturated exterior color palette, the gorgeous candle-lit
interiors, and the good use of shallow focus close-ups by Dibb and
cinematographer Laurie Rose (Ben Wheatley’s regular DP) perfectly embodies the
hopelessness of war and the unnerving emotions it brings to surface (also aided
by Natalie Holt’s unsettling orchestral score).
There are few stretches in the movie that may feel a bit of
a drag for a casual viewer, but for those interested in World War I history (like me)
it feels captivating right to the end. There might be nothing surprising in the
narrative, and the frustration, pain, and madness of war may have been more
supremely depicted in other works of cinematic masters. Yet it’s outstanding
cast, and earnest efforts to avoid sentimentality makes Journey’s End one of the
profound war-experience cinema in recent times. Stanhope is probably Sam
Claflin’s best role. Look out for the scene, where he sends his men to
their deaths, his eyes showcase a gamut of emotions within few minutes. To
Claflin’s credit, there’s not a tinge of melodrama in his characters’ downward
spiral. Paul Bettany’s Osborne is the gently swaying candlelight flame to
Stanhope’s forest-fire-like rage. It’s nothing short of heartbreaking to watch
Bettany calmly preparing for the worse, while retaining his amicable nature
even in the face of futility. The duo genuinely wrings out tears from our eyes, not just
for their characters, but also for the countless men who were really thrown to
their deaths by the posh officers. Eventually, Journey’s End (107 minutes)
isn’t just a dense catalog of battlefront horrors. It also pays tribute to the
strength and endurance of human spirit, which naturally outlasts the despicably
archaic worldview of apathetic Generals. Altogether, it’s a topnotch war drama
sans grandiose spectacle.
Trailer
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