There`s no such thing as a Scot who isn`t a fan of Robert Carlyle so I`m one of nearly five million people who has followed his career with some interest and vaguely remembered in 2001 he was starring in a POW drama called TO END ALL WARS but didn`t hear much else about the movie and after seeing it on TV a couple of nights ago I can certainly understand why it disappeared without trace . It is a very disappointing film
First of all I confess that movies set in Japanese POW camps deserve to be seen by everybody , unlike post war German society Japan never ever refers to the atrocities committed by their side during the second world war . Japanese history books are devoid of entries involving the invasion of Manchuria , the rape of Nang-King , the Bataan death march , Korean " Comfort women " and the Burma railway . Of course Japanese text books do mention the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki but that seems to be the only referrences to the second world war which is a bit like present day Germany claiming the war started with the bombing of Dresden and finished with the Red Army invading Berlin and raping the local women . So any movie that portrays the Imperial Japanese Army in a bad light is okay in my opinion
But the problem with TO END ALL WARS is two fold . First is the totally unfocussed characters . When the film was completed much was made that it " Starred " Robert Carlyle and Kiefer Sutherland but after seeing the movie it`s obvious that neither Carlyle`s character Campbell or Sutherland`s character Reardon is the main character - It`s Ciaran McMenamin`s Ernest Gordon the original author of the book and seeing both Carlyle and Sutherland are far better known faces than McMenamin the three characters compete for screen time in a rather uneven manner . Perhaps it would have been better if a fairly big name had been cast as Gordon with Campbell and Reardon being played by unknowns ? Especially since much of the tale is carried by Gordon`s narration . Secondly as several people have already pointed out much of the story feels like cliche . It`s probably not the fault of this production but why does every Japanese POW camp have to feature a loud brash American running a scam ? Both BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI and KING RAT feature similar characters . There`s a few other cliches along the way too
As I said this is a disappointing movie and due to the subject matter a rather depressing one too
First of all I confess that movies set in Japanese POW camps deserve to be seen by everybody , unlike post war German society Japan never ever refers to the atrocities committed by their side during the second world war . Japanese history books are devoid of entries involving the invasion of Manchuria , the rape of Nang-King , the Bataan death march , Korean " Comfort women " and the Burma railway . Of course Japanese text books do mention the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki but that seems to be the only referrences to the second world war which is a bit like present day Germany claiming the war started with the bombing of Dresden and finished with the Red Army invading Berlin and raping the local women . So any movie that portrays the Imperial Japanese Army in a bad light is okay in my opinion
But the problem with TO END ALL WARS is two fold . First is the totally unfocussed characters . When the film was completed much was made that it " Starred " Robert Carlyle and Kiefer Sutherland but after seeing the movie it`s obvious that neither Carlyle`s character Campbell or Sutherland`s character Reardon is the main character - It`s Ciaran McMenamin`s Ernest Gordon the original author of the book and seeing both Carlyle and Sutherland are far better known faces than McMenamin the three characters compete for screen time in a rather uneven manner . Perhaps it would have been better if a fairly big name had been cast as Gordon with Campbell and Reardon being played by unknowns ? Especially since much of the tale is carried by Gordon`s narration . Secondly as several people have already pointed out much of the story feels like cliche . It`s probably not the fault of this production but why does every Japanese POW camp have to feature a loud brash American running a scam ? Both BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI and KING RAT feature similar characters . There`s a few other cliches along the way too
As I said this is a disappointing movie and due to the subject matter a rather depressing one too