The Bridge on the River Kwai
Academy Award × 7·AFI #36·National Film Registry
Rent/Purchase
The classic story of English POWs in Burma forced to build a bridge to aid the war effort of their Japanese captors. British and American intelligence officers conspire to blow up the structure, but Col. Nicholson, the commander who supervised the bridge's construction, has acquired a sense of pride in his creation and tries to foil their plans.
What critics thought
One of the most celebrated war films ever made, David Lean's epic earns its reputation through psychological complexity rather than battlefield spectacle — it interrogates the irrationality of military honor and Britain's class system while keeping its thriller machinery running at full tension. Alec Guinness's performance is the film's center of gravity, but even Ebert noted the film leaves viewers genuinely uncertain what to make of its ending, a productive ambiguity that has fueled debate for decades.
“a towering entertainment of rich variety and revelation of the ways of men”
Bosley Crowther·The New York Times
“a dazzlingly musical sense and control of the many and involving rhythms of a vast composition. He shows a rare sense of humor and a feeling for the poetry of situation; and he shows the even rarer ability to express these things, not in lines but in lives.”
Time
“the 1957 epic subtly develops its themes about the irrationality of honor and the hypocrisy of Britain's class system without ever compromising its thrilling war narrative”
Christian Blauvelt·Slant Magazine
Genres
Adventure, Drama, War
Cast & Crew
DirectorDavid Lean
StarringWilliam Holden, Alec Guinness, Jack Hawkins, Sessue Hayakawa, James Donald
ComposerMalcolm Arnold
The Bridge on the River Kwai
Academy Award × 7·AFI #36·National Film Registry
The classic story of English POWs in Burma forced to build a bridge to aid the war effort of their Japanese captors. British and American intelligence officers conspire to blow up the structure, but Col. Nicholson, the commander who supervised the bridge's construction, has acquired a sense of pride in his creation and tries to foil their plans.
What critics thought
One of the most celebrated war films ever made, David Lean's epic earns its reputation through psychological complexity rather than battlefield spectacle — it interrogates the irrationality of military honor and Britain's class system while keeping its thriller machinery running at full tension. Alec Guinness's performance is the film's center of gravity, but even Ebert noted the film leaves viewers genuinely uncertain what to make of its ending, a productive ambiguity that has fueled debate for decades.
“a towering entertainment of rich variety and revelation of the ways of men”
Bosley Crowther·The New York Times
“a dazzlingly musical sense and control of the many and involving rhythms of a vast composition. He shows a rare sense of humor and a feeling for the poetry of situation; and he shows the even rarer ability to express these things, not in lines but in lives.”
Time
“the 1957 epic subtly develops its themes about the irrationality of honor and the hypocrisy of Britain's class system without ever compromising its thrilling war narrative”
Christian Blauvelt·Slant Magazine
Genres
Adventure, Drama, War
Cast & Crew
DirectorDavid Lean
StarringWilliam Holden, Alec Guinness, Jack Hawkins, Sessue Hayakawa, James Donald
ComposerMalcolm Arnold
Rent/Purchase