10 facts about the bridge on the river kwai 10 facts about the bridge on the river kwai

13. Parts of the Burma-Siam railway still stand. Nicholson objects, informing Saito the Geneva Convention exempts officers from manual labour. The region was seized by the Japanese in 1942, and they then set about making preparations . The Kwai River Bridge was part of the meter-gauge railway constructed by the Japanese during World War Two. [31][32] Some consider the film to be an insulting parody of Toosey. Put on your marching boots and whistle a jaunty tune as we investigate some behind-the-scenes facts about this enduring war film. Spiegel, the producer, bought the film rights to the book (the English version of which was called The Bridge Over the River Kwai) and hired Carl Foreman to write the script. 7. The Kanchanaburi Memorial sits with the cemetery grounds. Some Japanese viewers resented the movie's depiction of their engineers' capabilities as inferior and less advanced than they were in reality. In early 1943, World War II British prisoners arrive by train at a Japanese prison camp in Burma. By the end, prisoners working on the rail route werent calling it the Burma-Siam Railway. In 1957 the movie, The Bridge on the River Kwai, premiered in London and became the biggest grossing film of 1958, winning seven academy awards in the process, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Musical Score, Best Cinematography and Best Editing.Not bad for a movie that is largely a work of almost entirely fictional characters and a story which . They remain standing at attention throughout the day. The majority of its smaller components are originals, while a few are post-war replacements. [44], The film was re-released in 1964 and earned a further estimated $2.6 million at the box office in the United States and Canada[45] but the following year its revised total US and Canadian revenues were reported by Variety as $17,195,000. Just as in Love is a Many Splendored Thing, normally hairy chested William Holden had to have a full body wax for his many shirtless scenes in the movie. The British Film Institute placed The Bridge on the River Kwai as the 11th greatest British film. Train crossing the wooden bridge which spanned the Mae Klong River (renamed Kwai Yai River in 1960). Showing the impact of disease on the workforce, Kanchanaburi contains two graves holding the ashes of 300 Cholera victims. Lets examine the history behind the film and the men who made it. Surviving veterans consider Toosey one of the finest officers they ever served under. Vital equipment that would normally have been shipped through the canal had to be flown out to the location instead. The Bridge on the River Kwai. The Bridge on the River Kwai, commonly referred to as the Railroad of Death or Death Railway, which stands in Kanchanaburi, Thailand, was one of only eight steel bridges of the estimated 688 that were built. As it opens, two POWs, the American navy commander Shears (William Holden) and an Australian, are digging graves for their companions. Has only got one ball! While the British prisoners celebrate their accomplishment that night, the commandoes wire the bridge with explosives to be detonated by a plunger operated by a hidden soldier, timed to collapse the bridge just as an inaugural train carrying Japanese dignitaries is crossing it. Kanchanaburi town is located around 130 kilometres northwest of Bangkok. 18. Nicholson advises Saito that the officers cannot be required to do manual labour according to the Geneva Convention. "[53], Among retrospective reviews, Roger Ebert gave the film four out of four stars, noting that it is one of the few war movies that "focuses not on larger rights and wrongs but on individuals", but commented that the viewer is not certain what is intended by the final dialogue due to the film's shifting points of view. Allied bombers struck the wooden bridge and its concrete counterpart in February 1945 with one of the earliest uses of guided bombs in history. The Bridge on the River Kwai. Laughton was in his habitually overweight state, and was either denied insurance coverage, or was simply not keen on filming in a tropical location. This was an incorrect assumption. We worked at bayonet point and under bamboo lash, taking any risk to sabotage the operation whenever the opportunity arose. Both writers had to work in secret, as they were on the Hollywood blacklist and had fled to England in order to continue working. as soon as he signed, Lean borrowed $2,000 from Columbia Pictures to get his teeth fixed. Himmler Read our FAQs or send a question to our customer service team. This Week's Toybox is . 11. 25 March 1995. [18] The bridge in the film was near Kitulgala. In the setting of World War II, a defeated unit British Soldiers is marched into a Japanese prison camp in western Thailand, with the purpose of constructing a bridge over the River Kwai to carry a new railway line to invade Burma. The Japanese did indeed force British, Dutch, Australian, and American prisoners to build the Burma Railway, resulting in some 13,000 POW deaths and at least 80,000 civilian deaths. 2023 Commonwealth War Graves Commission. Pierre Boulle, a Frenchman, who had experienced great hardship after being captured by the Vichy French on the Mekong River, wrote a novel called 'Le Pont de la rivire Kwa' - The Bridge of the . Use our search tools to explore our records and find out about those we commemorate. does not fall onto the plunger, and the bridge suffers only minor damage. Shears is enjoying his hospital stay in Ceylon unwittingly within a commando school referred to as "Force 316" (likely based on the real world Force 136 of the Special Operations Executive (SOE)). Nicholson is shocked by the poor job being done by his men and orders the building of a proper bridge, intending it to stand as a tribute to the British Army's ingenuity for centuries to come. Their taskmasters were relentless. Guinness, however, had his own reservations. The Bridge on the River Kwai poses complex interpretive issues about the vagaries of war and military behavior as conveyed by the Japanese soldiers, Commander Saito, Lt. Col. Nicholson, and the British captives. The railway route, which ran through Burma and Thailand, had been planned by the British. There are tourist trains to Nam Tok stopping at stations in between daily from the River Kwai Bridge station at 06.05, 11.00 and 14.30. The story about this bridge has also been made into a Hollywood movie such as "The Bridge on the River Kwai" (1957), which is based on the novel of the same name and another movie . For the scenes where William Holden, Jack Hawkins, Geoffrey Horne and the native girls had to wade through swamps, they were wading through specially created ones. [46], On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film received an approval rating of 96% based on 93 reviews, with an average rating of 9.4/10. "[57], Some Japanese viewers have disliked the film's depiction of the Japanese characters and the historical background presented as being inaccurate, particularly in the interactions between Saito and Nicholson. So Spiegel hired another writer, Calder Willingham, to give it a crack. Lean wanted Holden, a big star and recent Oscar winner (for Stalag 17), to play American prisoner Major Shears, over the objections of producer Spiegel, who wanted Cary Grant. Sessue Hayakawa edited his copy of the script to contain only his lines of dialog. : 1942: Boldly advancing through Asia, the Japanese need a train route from Burma going north. The film was based on the 1952 novel Bridge over the River Kwai by Pierre Boulle. This Oscar-winning epic is part of movie folklore and widely considered to be one of the greatest films ever so I really wanted to see the area where director David Lean shot it way back in 1957. The casualties of the Burma-Siam railway were often buried in camp burial grounds located close to where they originally fell. All but a small section of the route was built in dense, malarial jungles, in sweltering heat and monsoon rains. A picture of the actual bridge over the River Kwai in June 2004. Two bridges were built; one was made of wood, one was made of concrete and steel. After a few days, the British medical officer Major Clipton (James Donald) tries to persuade both Saito and Nicholson to compromise, but both are unyielding. Basically, the bridge was built during World War II when the Japanese occupied Siam (now Thailand) and neighboring Burma (now Myanmar . 15- "All work and no play make Jack a dull boy.". The Bridge on the River Kwai is a British 1957 World War II film by David Lean based on the novel The Bridge Over the River Kwai by French writer Pierre Boulle. Starring Alec Guinness, William Holden, and Sessue Hayakawa, among others, it paints an . Best time to visit Bridge Over The River Kwai (preferred time): 09:00 am - 01:00 pm. [39], The major railway bridge described in the novel and film did not actually cross the river known at the time as the Kwai. The building of Bridge 277, the eponymous bridge that gave Leans film its name, was overseen by 2,000 British and Dutch prisoners of war. The action of the movie takes place in a Japanese prisoner-of-war (POW) camp in . Thanbyuzayat continued to be used as a POW reception centre to reinforce work parties along the Burma-Siam Railway. 12. In the movie the bridge is destroyed by commandos. The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) Addeddate 2021-08-19 15:12:20 Identifier the-bridge-on-the-river-kwai_202108 Scanner Internet Archive HTML5 Uploader 1.6.4. plus-circle Add Review. Approximately 5 kilometres north of Kanchanaburi there were two bridges that were built by POWs during the war. In reality, Japanese engineers proved to be just as capable at construction efforts as their Allied counterparts.[58][59]. [16], Director David Lean clashed repeatedly with his cast members, particularly Guinness and James Donald, who thought the novel was anti-British. Pitted against the warden, Colonel . The US was beginning to control the sea lanes, making it increasingly difficult for Japanese shipborne cargo to reach the army dotted across the Pacific. The key sites containing Thailand and Burma war graves related to Death Railway and the Bridge on the River Kwai are: Kanchanaburi War Cemetery is located a short distance from the former Kanburi POW camp. Subsequent releases of the film finally gave them proper screen credit. [55] Slant stated that "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", and in comparing to other films of the time said that Bridge on the River Kwai "carefully builds its psychological tension until it erupts in a blinding flash of sulfur and flame. FIFTY years ago waves of Liberator bombers were deliberately destroying a remarkable feat of engineering. About Press Copyright Contact us Creators Advertise Developers Terms Privacy Policy & Safety How YouTube works Test new features NFL Sunday Ticket Press Copyright . Express 08:30, 10:30. One of the biggest causes of ire was the treatment of Toosey. Read our Cookie Policy, Terms & Conditions and Data Protection & Privacy Policy. 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. Following the raids, Thanbyuzayat was evacuated. The classic story of English POWs in Burma forced to build a bridge to aid the war effort of their Japanese captors. The Bridge On The River Kwai Trivia: Fun And Interesting Facts About The Bridge On The River Kwai: Fascinating Facts About The Bridge on the River Kwai - Kindle edition by Randolph, Amanda. The movie was mainly filmed in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) and also in England. It is close to, but not over the country's border with Myanmar. [35], Lieutenant Colonel Philip Toosey of the British Army was the real senior Allied officer at the bridge in question. [5][6] It has been included on the American Film Institute's list of best American films ever made. [30], A 1969 BBC television documentary, Return to the River Kwai, made by former POW John Coast,[33] sought to highlight the real history behind the film (partly through getting ex-POWs to question its factual basis, for example Dr Hugh de Wardener and Lt-Col Alfred Knights), which angered many former POWs. 17. Image: Bridge 277 aka the real Bridge over the River Kwai, Image: The iconic poster of the 1957 classic. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. Its construction came about because Japan needed another supply route to link Singapore and Malaysia to its possessions in Burma following Singapores fall in February 1942. Allied soldiers had built a church and a hospital on the site where the cemetery now sits. In the film, Lt. Col Nicholson is seen collaborating with his captors, even under duress. The elephants employed in helping build the bridge would take breaks every four hours and lie around the water, whether the crew wanted them to or not. Has something sim'lar Like Chungkai and Kanchanaburi, Thanbyuzayat War Cemetery was originally part of the camp set up serving the Burma-Siams construction. Nicholson undertakes the construction of a well-made bridge, at first thinking it a good way to improve the morale and discipline of his regiment but gradually coming to regard the structure not as a part of the enemy war effort but as a monument to British ingenuity. Starring Alec Guinness, it depicts the struggles and defiance of Japanese prisoners of war building the fictional Burma railway between 1943-44. The film"s story was loosely based on a true World War II incident, and the real-life character of Lieutenant Colonel Philip Toosey. Assistant director John Kerrison was killed in a car crash on the way to one of the locations. But whats the real story? [7][8] In 1999, the British Film Institute voted The Bridge on the River Kwai the 11th greatest British film of the 20th century. Everywhere in the jungle, the graveyards made their appearance; starting in a small way they gradually grew bigger, until when the railway was completed at the end of the year, thousands of bodies lay in the jungle from one end to the other.. However, in 1943 a railway bridge was built by Allied POWs over the Mae Klong river renamed Khwae Yai in the 1960s as a result of the film at Tha Ma Kham, five kilometres from Kanchanaburi, Thailand. This, plus the fact that he loved to travel, plus the fact that shooting a film in Southeast Asia would be good for him tax-wise, motivated him to accept a project that was bound to be grueling. The bridge construction is going badly, however, and Saito offers concessions to Nicholson in an effort to get the structure completed on schedule. Construction of the Burma-Siam railway began in October 1942 and would end in October 1943. All the filming locations of The Bridge on the River Kwai are listed below. Mitch Miller had a hit with a recording of both marches. Neither of them got credit, though, as The Bridge on the River Kwai was released during the three-year period when people who'd ever been Communists (or who refused to answer questions about it before Congress) were ineligible for Academy Awards. The correct name for the River Kwai is Khwae Noi, meaning small tributary, which merges with Khwae Yai River to create the Mae Kong River. For all the death and misery caused by its building, the Burma-Siam Railway only ever carried two Japanese divisions and 500,000 tons of supplies before VJ Day brought the war in Asia to a close. Bridge On The River Kwai is an Epic war-based film. [63], The film was restored in 1985 by Columbia Pictures. Omissions? A make-up man was also badly injured in the same accident. Part of this project was building bridges over Thailand's Kwai Yai, at a place named Tamarkan, which is near a town named Kanchanaburi. David Lean, director of such landmark epics as Lawrence of Arabia and Doctor Zhivago, didn't always make giant movies. (Spiegel got a British military adviser to help with that side of things, too.). Prior to casting Alec Guinness, Sam Spiegel tried to persuade Spencer Tracy to play the part of Colonel Nicholson. In the meantime, Shears manages to escape. Over 65,000 Allied P.O.W.s battled torture, starvation, and disease to hack the 255-mile railway out of harsh jungle for the Japanese. Nicholson will not cooperate and finally insists that the bridge can be built only under his command. 7. Tonight, enjoy dinner at a hotel restaurant Overnight: Kanchanaburi US $4.49 Standard Shipping from outside US. During its construction, approximately 13,000 prisoners of war died and were buried along the railway. The bridge, several museums, and cemeteries have respectfully preserved the history and memorialized the dead. Supplying it by ship was the only practical solution. Weill you be in London for the Coronation in 2023? Toosey in fact did as much as possible to delay the building of the bridge. The bridge they build will become a symbol of service and survival to one prisoner, Colonel Nicholson, a proud perfectionist. Sessue Hayakawa considered his performance as Saito as the highlight of his career. (Lean denied ever wanting Laughton for the role, despite abundant documented evidence to the contrary.). The Bridge on the River Kwai was actually one of the reasons movies started becoming prime-time television programming. The documentary itself was described by one newspaper reviewer when it was shown on Boxing Day 1974 (The Bridge on the River Kwai had been shown on BBC1 on Christmas Day 1974) as "Following the movie, this is a rerun of the antidote."[37]. Lean wanted Charles Laughton (who'd starred in his 1954 film Hobson's Choice) to play Colonel Nicholson, the role that ultimately went to Alec Guinness. "[55], Balu Mahendra, the Tamil film director, observed the shooting of this film at Kitulgala, Sri Lanka during his school trip and was inspired to become a film director. "[17], The film was made in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka). 4. The Bridge over the River Kwai (French: Le Pont de la rivire Kwa) is a novel by the French novelist Pierre Boulle, published in French in 1952 and English translation by Xan Fielding in 1954. Warden, Shears, and two other commandos parachute into Thailand; one, Chapman, dies after falling into a tree, and Warden is wounded in an encounter with a Japanese patrol and must be carried on a litter. [66] The original negative for the feature was scanned at 4k (four times the resolution in High Definition), and the colour correction and digital restoration were also completed at 4k. At the end of the day, the officers are imprisoned, and Nicholson is thrown into the ovena small box made of corrugated metal. British people of Anglotopia, what do you make of the whole anglophile thing ? Both the wooden and the adjacent steel bridge were subjected to numerous air raids between January and June 1945. Some of the Second World War's fiercest battles involved bridges and inspired some riveting accounts - capture of key bridges (Cornelius Ryan's "The Longest Day"; Stephen. [40] Boulle had never been to the bridge. At its behest, Sam Spiegel asked David Lean to incorporate a love scene. Starring Alec Guinness, it depicts the struggles and defiance of Japanese prisoners of war building the fictional Burma railway between 1943-44. [26], A memorable feature of the film is the tune that is whistled by the POWsthe first strain of the "Colonel Bogey March"when they enter the camp. A train carrying important dignitaries and soldiers is scheduled to be the first to cross the bridge the following day, and Warden wants to destroy both. Witnessing the carnage, Clipton shakes his head and mutters, "Madness! Be the first one to write a review. But Laughton, a fine actor with such credits as The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939) on his resume, was in poor physical shapegreat for playing the corpulent Henry VIII in Young Bess (1953), not so great for playing a British military officer in a prison camp. He didn't like the next draft of the screenplay, either, because it made Nicholson "a blinkered character." The cemetery was established by the Army Graves Service to hold casualties made along the railways southern Bangkok to Nieke section. The Bridge on the River Kwai is a British 1957 movie from Columbia Pictures, based on Pierre Boulle's 1952 book The Bridge over the River Kwai (French: Le Pont de la Rivire Kwai). Kwai's composer, Malcolm Arnold, wove the march into his Oscar-winning score so seamlessly that modern viewers may assume it was original to the film. Since it first graced the silver screen won the admiration of audiences everywhere and continues to do so. 1. Although the film uses the historical setting of the construction of the Burma Railway in 19421943, the plot and characters of Boulle's novel and the screenplay are almost entirely fictional. Ernest Gordon, a survivor of the railway construction and POW camps described in the novel/film, stated in his 1962 book, Through the Valley of the Kwai: In Pierre Boulle's book The Bridge over the River Kwai and the film which was based on it, the impression was given that British officers not only took part in building the bridge willingly, but finished in record time to demonstrate to the enemy their superior efficiency. Please select which sections you would like to print: Pat Bauer graduated from Ripon College in 1977 with a double major in Spanish and Theatre. This article is part of our Classic Film Throwback series - By Sam Hendrian - "Madness. The railway ran for 250 miles from Ban Pong, Thailand to Thanbyuzayat, Burma and is now known as the Death Railway. [40], The Bridge on the River Kwai was a massive commercial success. The Bridge on the River Kwai, British-American war film, released in 1957 and directed by David Lean, that was both a critical and popular success and became an enduring classic.