The fact that “The Way Back” is only loosely adapted from a historically unreliable and largely discredited memoir by Slavomir Rawicz ultimately proves to be its major weakness. If this story was true, then it would be amazing enough to gloss over the uneven pacing present throughout Peter Weir’s film adaptation. If people really had trekked 6500 kilometres from a Siberian Gulag prison camp into India, travelling through gruelling conditions, harsh terrain and the most horrifying deprivations, then we could forgive the lack of compelling characterisation and story because the historical veracity would speak loudly enough to fill the gaps. However, since this never actually happened, a potentially great story is relegated to being merely a good one - enjoyable, but nowhere near as gripping as it could have been. As it should have been.
The movie opens in 1940 Russia with a Polish army officer named Janusz (Jim Sturgess) being betrayed by his wife after Soviet Communists beat a confession against him out of her. Condemned as a spy, Janusz is transported to a freezing Siberian prison camp where he meets up with an imprisoned actor who outlines an escape plan. The actor is more of a talker than a doer, so Janusz ends up escaping during a snow blizzard with some other prisoners. These prisoners include a mysterious American known only as Mr. Smith (Ed Harris), a psychopath criminal named Valka (Colin Farrell), and a few others. Thus begins an epic journey of thousands of miles in which not all of them will survive. Along the way they are joined by a young Polish women named Irene (Saoirse Ronan) who joins them on their quest for freedom.
Weir certainly does justice to the journey itself, through a superb combination of wide and magnificent sweeping landscape views, to some rather raw and visceral narrowed down shots of the group struggling to hold onto their humanity as they starve, freeze and generally suffer to the very limits of human endurance. This is the one issue Weir interrogates really well as when men see birds and wolves tearing at carrion and then run to gorge themselves on it in similar fashion, then how much of themselves do they lose in the process? Or do they gain something by being humbled and reminded of their essential humanity and their kinship with other animals? The savage effects of the journey are never hidden from us, as we see characters slowly being stripped away by the harshness of life in the wild until there is not enough of them left to carry on. They wither and fade into the icy snow, or disintegrate to the point they are swept away like so much dust in the wild, desert winds.
This is where I am brought back to my original point: That because this story did not really happen, the emotional effect of any decline and loss is almost completely flattened out. Much time is taken up watching others journey and suffer, but almost no time is spent getting to know them and building any sense of connection. Other than Jim Sturgess himself, and the Polish lass who has a few deeply touching scenes with the always effective Ed Harris, the rest of the characters are neither here nor there. Colin Farrell’s Russian criminal only stands out because he is given a little more screen time, although Farrell does the character no justice with his over the top portrayal.
Don’t get me wrong, “The Way Back” is a better than average movie, but it does seem to get a little lost on its own particular journey. There is much to commend it but I guess after movies like ‘The Truman Show’ and ‘Master and Commander,’ one begins to expect more from Peter Weir. Three (and a half) stars out of five.