Lawrence of Arabia (1962) dir. David Lean
Starring: Peter O'Toole, Omar Sharif, Anthony Quinn, Anthony Quayle, Alec Guinness

By Alan Bacchus

While there isn't a single female in the film — it's three hours and 42 minutes of masculinity — the romantic feeling is strong. A romance of the windswept Middle Eastern deserts, the spiritual connection to the rigors of the untamed environment and the exotic culture of the Arabic peoples. Cinematographer Freddie Young's unrivalled 70mm photography translates marvelously to high definition Blu-ray. Each shot is so rich, detailed and classically precise that, at times, it looks as if we're viewing a Jacques-Louis David Neoclassical painting.

As cinematically epic as the visuals are, the marvel of the film is Lean's ability to create intimacy within his broad canvas. Peter O'Toole's iconic performance as Lawrence is still as marvellous, delightful and mysterious as ever. It's hard to imagine anyone else's striking blonde hair or piercing blue eyes on the screen. Lean elegantly weaves in the political narrative with Lawrence's ascendance as a military officer. Like his Arab compatriot, Lawrence is inextricably linked by the independent, vagabond lifestyle. Lawrence never fits in anywhere; he's uncomfortable in the starched British officer's uniform and is never fully accepted wearing the Arab attire given to him by the people he's trying to save. O'Toole's off-kilter performance is lyrical, poetic and, at times, grating and abrasive.

Some of the most memorable visual moments in the film are the smallest: the introduction of Omar Sharif, emerging from a mirage, is always discussed. However, a smaller but equally significant moment is Lawrence's decision to take Aqaba, the port city protected by massive Turkish guns. The decisive moment is visualized by two Arab minions who accidentally hit him in the back with a rock. For days they had been sitting in agonizing contemplation of how to turn the tide of war. The seemingly insignificant and accidental action becomes the plan to cross the un-crossable desert and attack Aqaba from behind. The pay-off is one of the greatest sequences and shots in cinema history. The Aqaba attack sequence is brilliantly choreographed with thousands of extras and horses in real time and space, mixing intense on-the-ground close-ups with awe-inspiring wide shots from the hillside. It's capped off with a superlative long take of the camera panning over the army of horses running through the Aqaba village, ending on those heavy artillery guns looking out towards the sea.

Still, as much as the film is beloved, some issues remain. Despite the casting of Omar Sharif, we still have to endure Brits and Americans, such as Sir Alec Guinness, Anthony Quinn and Jose Ferrer, playing Arabs and Turks with fake noses and dark face. And it's impossible not to feel the lack of narrative momentum after the intermission — there's no doubt the film's best moments are in the first half.

The Sony Blu-ray comes in two options: a massive box set and a cheaper but still impressive two-disc set. The smaller edition contains two new featurettes for the HD release: a comprehensive discussion with Peter O'Toole reflecting on the film and his creative collaborators, and an interactive featurette that incorporates tidbits of production and historical information into the film. Archived featurettes range from documentaries dating back to the '60s and '70s, material from its restoration in the early '90s and material created for its DVD release in the '00s.

This review first appeared on Exclaim.ca

Great Expectations (1946) dir. David Lean
Starring: John Mills, Valerie Hobson, Alec Guinness, Marita Hunt, Finlay Currie, Bernard Miles

****

By Alan Bacchus

According to the IMDb, some 14 versions of Great Expectations have been made either as feature films, TV movies or mini-series. Though I haven’t seen them all, few could dispute David Lean’s 1946 film as arguably the greatest. It certainly truncates Dickens’ expansive novel, condensing much of the narrative. But none of the other versions were filmed by a master as great as David Lean. His version of the classic novel is visualized with as much creative inspiration as Dickens’ own writing, a parallel work of art with equal authorship between both storytellers.

The story of Pip, the young orphan whose secret benefactor brings him into upper-class society where he discovers how to be a gentleman, at the same time alienates them and then eventually learns to appreciate the humility of the lower-class adopted family, is adapted with rich gothic intrigue and noir-ish texture and detail.

For David Lean, this was the middle stage of his career, some 10 years after his time as an editor and 10 years before his late career series of epic pictures for which he’d become synonymous. In the 20 years or so before The Bridge on the River Kwai, Lean established himself as a British auteur of sorts, breaking new ground in storytelling, cinematography and editing.

Watching his movies in order, we can clearly see a progression of his cinematic voice and eye. Great Expectations looks to be his biggest stylistic leap, as he authors Dickens’ novel with a distinct film noir tone. Actually, his stunning visual designs and mise-en-scène look strikingly comparable to that of Orson Welles, perhaps influenced by the landmark Citizen Kane. Lean’s stark black and white contrasts, deep focus wide-angle photography and superlative camera moves are still stunning to watch. In particular, watch the introduction of Pip to Miss Havisham in the opening act. Lean’s camera enters Havisham’s mansion following Pip and Estella through the door, the foyer, the hall and up the stairs – all in one shot. Same with the celebrated opening sequence in the graveyard where Pip meets Magwitch, a scene orchestrated with dense brooding atmosphere, thick fog and ominous leave-less trees.

Look for Lean’s clever use of editing and narration to compress time, which splendidly condenses Dickens’ novel into the film’s 2-hour time frame, an achievement comparable to Welles’s compression of time in Kane.

Lean’s genius goes beyond the technique, as he has the rare ability to make his style enhance his substance. Great Expectations is no exception. Lean engineers marvellous performances out of Tony Wager as young Pip and John Mills as older Pip. Alec Guinness’s turn as the affable Herbert Pocket shows the funny bone that Welles never really had. But the most memorable performance directed by Lean is Bernard Miles’ sympathetic yet honourable Joe Gargery, who represents the heart and soul of Pip.

Two years later, Lean would complete one of the great one-two punches in cinematic history with his adaptation of Oliver Twist, a film of equal stature in cinema circles, and the perfect companion piece to Great Expectations – Dickens’ two most famous works paired together by arguably Britain’s greatest director.

The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) dir. David Lean
Starring: Alec Guinness, Sessue Hayakawa, William Holden, James Donald, Jack Hawkins

****

By Alan Bacchus

I once met a WWII veteran who was imprisoned in a Japanese POW camp not unlike the one depicted in this film. Not surprisingly, his opinion of the realism of this film was bunkum. In Kwai, David Lean and producer Sam Spiegel romanticize prison camp life, dulling down the shear brutality and torture that occurred, but as someone once said, "the truth should never get in the way of a good story" and The Bridge on the River Kwai is one of the greats.

Lean was a master of framing great characters against huge canvasses of war. Such is the case with Kwai and his duelling rivals: Col Saito and Col Nicholson. Saito is the hard-line commandant of a POW camp in Western Thailand charged with building a bridge to complete the Burmese Railway, while Nicholson is the British career officer determined to maintain his dignity and pride, even if it means collaborating with the enemy and thus building a bridge better than the Japanese could to prove his superiority as a soldier and man of honour.

Character depth is heavily weighted towards Nicholson, unfortunately, as, after the first act, Saito gets the short shrift. But it's a magnificent character arc for Nicholson, culminating in blowing up his own bridge, a great cinematic representation of the contradictions of war, not unlike the absurdities in Apocalypse Now, Full Metal Jacket or Renoir's The Grand Illusion.

Lean contrasts Nicholson's British snobbiness with the pragmatism of the American Shears, played by William Holden, who provides the parallel story to the action in the camp. His un-heroic escape from prison and eventual return to regain his pride and dignity links up memorably with the grand finale.

The standard plastic jewel box just wouldn't cut it for a film of this grandeur and prestige. As such, though it's not bursting at the seams with extras, the new Blu-Ray comes in a large, beautifully designed, sturdy box worthy of the greatness of the film inside. Along with the pristine looking high-def image, this "collector's edition" comes with a glossy hardcover book with photos and liner notes to go along with some of the requisite, but unnecessary, "lobby cards."Seriously, does anyone really care about lobby cards?

Though British soldiers in Japanese war camps weren't whistling military marches during their incarceration, in terms of cinematic storytelling, The Bridge on the River Kwai is still a jolly good show.

Doctor Zhivago (1965) dir. David Lean
Starring: Omar Sharif, Julie Christie, Alec Guinness, Rod Steiger, Tom Courtney

****

By Alan Bacchus

It’s probably unfashionable to love Doctor Zhivago but there’s no need to deny one’s passions. David Lean’s superlative epic wasn’t the first sprawling love story set against the grandeur of history and war, but along with Gone With the Wind, Doctor Zhivago arguably is what every filmmaker hopes to achieve for their own period romances. From Titanic, Australia, Pearl Harbor and on and on, Doctor Zhivago is the benchmark these films are trying to measure up to.


David Lean had spent most of his directorial career on more smaller studio productions, but with the success of Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) his cinematic canvas got larger and larger. Next came Lawrence of Arabia (1962) and then Doctor Zhivago (1965). His 1970 epic Ryan Daughter was a failure, but for the previous three, it’s a remarkable trio of films.

As per Boris Pasternak’s novel, Doctor Zhivago charts the illicit romance of a married doctor/poet, Yuri and a gorgeous but emotionally damaged temptress Lara. Lean begins at the end of the story with Zhivago’s Communist brother (Alec Guinness) who operates a giant water dam questioning a young girl about her mother, presumably Lara. Flashing back to before the Russian Revolution we see Lara (Christie) wrestle between a relationship with her Revolutionary boyfriend Pasha (Courtney) and an affair with father’s business partner Komarovsky (Steiger). After a suicide attempt, Doctor Yuri (Omar Sharif) tends to Lara thus, their first meeting.

Yuri, himself, is married and with a child, and it isn’t until years later while a medic in WWI does he formally meet up with Lara who is a nurse on the front lines. Romance now strikes amid the horror of battle, a romance which blooms into the full blown affair which will emcompass the rest of the film. Pasternak and Lean both overcome the hurdle of having their main character generate sympathy despite being an adulterer and abandoning his family.

It’s in these contradictions where Doctor Zhivago triumphs. The complexities of the Yuri’s inner pain rarely come out, instead the tumultuous and violent historical background is the expression of his feelings. In the middle act when Yuri is at his most unlikeable, a man so lustful of Lara, he can’t help but lie to his wife and leave his family alone in their rural home to visit and thus make love to his mistress. Lara, who also recognizes their wrongdoings, also comes off as sympathetic.

Perhaps even more so with Zhivago than in Kwai or Lawrence, Lean manages to put as much attention on the details as the big picture scope. In fact, if anything the spectacle of history is put farther into the background than either of his other epics. Unlike the other two pictures, most of Zhivago is spent indoors, protected from the coldness of the Russian winter. Take for instance the interiors of the Moscow scenes. Lara’s apartment is dimly lit and claustrophobic even, and rarely does Lean go outside the confines of these locations. And when he does, Lean dramatically contrasts this intimacy with awe inspiring scenes, a sharp contrast which enhances the spectacle. The best example is Lean’s reveal of the worker’s revolt which engulfs the streets of Moscow on the night of the Lara’s dramatic breakdown – the emotional fury and anger of people who stand off against the army mirroring Lara’s internal trauma.

Lean’s background as an editor serves him well, he constantly uses abrupt transitions to take us in an out of the flashbacks and compressing time in unorthodox ways. His compositions are masterful from his expansive wideshots to the detailed close-ups, his control of every detail is mindboggling. And Maurice Jarre’s elegant score – his ‘Lara’s Theme', then a legitimate pop music hit – becomes the blanket of tone and emotional feeling which ties everything together.

Call me a softy, but I get chills even as I write this...

‘Doctor Zhivago’ is available on Blu-Ray from Warner Home Video

Hobson’s Choice (1954) dir. David Lean
Starring: Charles Laughton, Brenda De Banzie, John Mills, Daphne Anderson, Prunella Scales

****

By Alan Bacchus

David Lean’s marvellous humanist comedy, based on the play by Prunella Scales, is invisible to its age. Lean’s visual flare and eye for composition combined with working class rags to riches story looks as fabulous now as it did then.

Before David Lean started making colour films with big canvases on location he made even more and arguably even better smaller studio films in Britain. Lean was a dynamo with the camera, a style not that dissimilar from one of his contemporaries, Orson Welles. From 1942 to 1955, including 'Oliver Twist', 'Great Expectations', 'Brief Encounter', 'Hobson’s Choice' and 'Summertime', Lean managed to open up his confined locations using expressive constrasty lighting and deep focus photography techniques more in common with film noir.

Charles Laughton plays Hobson a cantankerous shoe store owner who works his three daughters to the bone, without any pay, for the sake of the family. But they are all marrying age and so Hobson has to deal the prospect of a) losing his workstaff and b) having to pay a ‘settlement’ to their prospective husbands. Ever the stingy capitalist, Hobson has avoided this ‘choice’ as long as he can. With no other options Maggie decides to take it upon herself to find a husband. She doesn't look farther than the shoe shop and target's Hobson's best bootmaker Willie Mossop. Maggie convinces Willie of marriage not as romance, but mutual convenience, a business relationship which would help them start a new shoe business, find mates as well sticking it to the rueful Hobson.

London never looked better than through Lean's eye. The photography of the city’s fog drenched skies and rough cobblestone roads add invaluable texture and realism to the environment. His interior scenes mostly take place in the confined spaces of Hobson’s shop, or Maggie/Willie’s flat, yet Lean’s camera is surprisingly mobile and moves with elegance (and motivation) around the rooms with ease.

As a working class triumph of will, the journey of Maggie from a subjgated worker drone spinster into an independent business woman and eventually loving wife is great storytelling. Charles Laughton is at his crabby best playing the stubborn and oppressive patriarch of the family who in his selfishness just can’t bear to see his daughter’s succeed. And so when we see Maggie decide to take her life into her own hands and choose her own destiny it’s marvelously inspiring.

In the second act, as we see Maggie lift herself up and go through the machinations of starting her own shoe business it becomes a smart business story. In fact, I was reminded of how we saw Claudette Colbert engineer her own pancake business with Louise Beavers in ‘Imitation of Life’.

John Mills as Maggie’s husband is perhaps overly characterized as a childish nave completely naive and complicit to whatever Maggie says or does. If anything Willie’s roll could have been strengthened by emphasizing his contribution to Maggie’s business as a real boot artist. But as comedy, his simplicity overcomes any deficiencies. In the final act when Willie and Maggie have to get married, and thus, CONSUMATE Lean takes his time to craft a humourous climax (pun intended) showing the frightening moments before Willie has to finally go to bed with Maggie. Of course sex is never mentioned, but the subtextual and visual suggestions make the buildup surprisingly tense.

“Hobson’s Choice” expresses themes of feminism, humanity and both condemns and celebrates capitalism with a light British comedic flare, and of course David Lean’s superb filmmaking skills.

The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) dir. David Lean
Starring Alec Guinness, Sessue Hayakawa, William Holden

****

Prior to “Bridge on the River Kwai” David Lean was known for his 2 Dickens adaptations – “Oliver Twist” and “Great Expectations” – and a series of small-scale British character dramas, such as “Brief Encounter”. And so David Lean was, at the time, an odd choice of director for the film (both John Ford and Howard Hawks were considered). It’s good Lean was given the assignment because propelled him into the pantheon of film history and allowed go on to make “Lawrence of Arabia” and “Doctor Zhivago”.

The film’s opening credit sequence tells you this isn’t your ordinary Hollywood war film. The camera is mounted on a real train, traveling through the jungles of Siam (now Thailand) – though it’s Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) substituting for Siam – it’s an actual jungle. No plastic Hollywood trees, no process shots or studio-based rear projection. It’s on location filming, which automatically elevates the authenticity and credibility.

The British soldiers on the train are being brought to a Japanese POW camp led by the brutal Col. Saito (Sessue Hayakawa). But when the troops (privates and officers) are given their first instructions to immediately start work, the leader of British soldiers, Col Nicholson (Alec Guinness) protests. Nicholson stands at attention and maintains his position that under the Geneva Code officers are not permitted to do hard labour. Nicholson’s motives are not egotistical. Instead it’s calculated. He knows the only way for his soldiers to survive the camp is to live under their own terms, and not those of the Japanese. Therefore maintaining the order and protocol of King’s military is of utmost importance.

And so the battle of wills begins. Nicholson stubbornly endures the most ghastly of painful abuses, weeks of physical and mental torture continue for the Colonel, until finally Saito loses the battle and gives into Nicholson’s demand. Meanwhile Saito is given orders by his superiors to build a bridge across the Kwai river so Japanese soldiers can transport valuable arms across Asia. Nicholson is tasked with managing and coordinating the building effort. When the work begins Nicholson takes the effort more seriously than he should. Nicholson’s fellow officers question his steadfast desire not just to complete the work, but Nicholson’s insistence on making the best quality bridge possible. Nicholson’s British upper class superiority complex blinds him to the real war effort.

Intercut with the events at the camp is the journey of a former camp escapee Cmdr. Shears (William Holden) who is roped into going back to the camp, infiltrating it and blowing up the bridge. This storyline though essential to adding counterpoint to the main plot is the weakest part of the film. Holden’s performance as the typical disinterested American working for the British pales in comparison to the stubborn nobleman of Alec Guinness. But the ending which brings everyone together at the opening of the bridge and first shipment to cross it is a brilliant sequence of editing and staging.

Warning spoilers ahead…


The famous explosion scene actually blew up the bridge-set that was used throughout the film. They only built one bridge for the film, and blowing it up was so risky, it meant they couldn’t do reshoots. The footage was so valuable, producer Sam Speigal reportedly shipped the film canisters to the lab via 5 different airplanes to spread out the risk of total loss.

Alec Guinness’ performance, which deservedly won him an Oscar is the highlight of the film. From his first scene, he captures your attention, and you literally cannot take your eyes away from the screen.

As mentioned “Bridge on the River Kwai” was Lean’s first epic, and the rest of his film career would be a series of films which attempted to top the previous. Though I’m grateful for all the later films, the smaller, more intimate films he could have made unfortunately never materialized. Enjoy.

Buy it here: The Bridge on the River Kwai