Questions or feedback on our new site? 16- "You make me sick with your heroics! Shears, who is a British commando officer like Warden in the novel, became an American sailor who escapes from the POW camp. Other parts have been placed in various local war museums. [54] Slant magazine gave the film four out of five stars. Mitch Miller had a hit with a recording of both marches. California Doubling: The film is set in Thailand, but was filmed in Ceylon (present-day Sri Lanka), a distinction the publicity of the time didn't see fit to make clear.Instead, it raved about the movie being shot in Ceylon in a way which implied the real-life River Kwai was located there. Witnessing the carnage, Clipton shakes his head and mutters, "Madness! Chandran Rutnam and William Holden while shooting The Bridge on the River Kwai. It is close to, but not over the country's border with Myanmar. When, the next morning, Saito orders all the British prisoners to begin building the bridge under the command of a Japanese engineer, Nicholson and the other officers refuse, even when Saito threatens to kill them. They were supported by an unknown number of Malaysian labourers. The Colonel Bogey March" was composed in 1914 by Kenneth Alford, a military band conductor. They remain standing at attention throughout the day. He wanders into a Burmese village, is nursed back to health, and eventually reaches the British colony of Ceylon. The camp commander, Colonel Saito (Sessue Hayakawa), informs the prisoners that they will all begin working on the building of a railway bridge the following day. Toosey later defended him in his war crimes trial after the war, and the two became friends. The action of the movie takes place in a Japanese prisoner-of-war (POW) camp in . Ten Interesting Facts about The Bridge on the River Kwai - Anglotopia.net [10], Although Lean later denied it, Charles Laughton was his first choice for the role of Nicholson. It was repaired in time to be blown up the next morning, with Bandaranaike and his entourage present. It spans crosses the lazily winding Khwae Noi at Kanchanaburi, Thailand. Part of this project was building bridges over Thailand's Kwai Yai, at a place named Tamarkan, which is near a town named Kanchanaburi. 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)). 8. 2. Lets examine the history behind the film and the men who made it. The steel bridge was repaired and is still in use today. Brigadier Varley would survive the hellish building work along the Burma-Siam Railway but not the war. The place: Japanese prisoner-of-war camp in Burma. Just two months later, Lieutenant Lamb was dead. He didn't like the next draft of the screenplay, either, because it made Nicholson "a blinkered character." 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. By Barry Fox. David Leans 1957 epic Bridge on the River Kwai is regarded as one of the all-time great war films. "[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. Himmler Top 10 Thailand River Cruises August 2024 - AffordableTours Bridge over the River Kwai, Kanchanaburi, Thailand. This story is retold in: Anecdotal Tit Bits: Making "The Bridge on the River Kwai", "links for research, Allied POWs under the Japanese", "The Colonel of Tamarkan: Philip Toosey and the Bridge on the River Kwai", "The Colonel of Tamarkan: Philip Toosey and the, "Once-Stupendous-Now-Modest $2,700,000 Budget Kept Secret; 'River Kwai's' Sockfull Gross", "Screen: 'The Bridge on the River Kwai' Opens", "Film Reviews: The Bridge on the River Kwai", "Balu Mahendra, who made his visuals speak, dies at 74", "Warren Buffett carries an American Express card and about $400 in cash", "How Cartrivision's 1972 VCR ForesawAnd ForfeitedThe Time-Shifted Future", "Movies | Disc & Digital | Sony Pictures", "Wayne and Shuster Show, The Episode Guide (19541990) (series)", Lost and Found: The Story of Cook's Anchor, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance), Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit, Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture Drama, National Board of Review Award for Best Film, New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Film, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Bridge_on_the_River_Kwai&oldid=1138405911, Films featuring a Best Actor Academy Award-winning performance, Films featuring a Best Drama Actor Golden Globe winning performance, Films that won the Best Original Score Academy Award, Films whose cinematographer won the Best Cinematography Academy Award, Films whose director won the Best Directing Academy Award, Films whose director won the Best Director Golden Globe, Films whose editor won the Best Film Editing Academy Award, Films whose writer won the Best Adapted Screenplay Academy Award, Films with screenplays by Michael Wilson (writer), United States National Film Registry films, World War II films based on actual events, Short description is different from Wikidata, Album articles lacking alt text for covers, Articles with unsourced statements from January 2021, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, Best DVD Original Retrospective Documentary/Featurette, Online Film & Television Association Awards, This page was last edited on 9 February 2023, at 14:21. Read more. Following the raids, Thanbyuzayat was evacuated. The rest were made of wood and local materials. Once Spiegel relented, he realized Holden was a box office draw and offered him a great deal: $300,000 salary (about $2.5 million in 2016 dollars), plus 10 percent of the gross. The Bridge on the River Kwai / Trivia - TV Tropes [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. ", The screenwriters, Carl Foreman and Michael Wilson, were on the Hollywood blacklist and, even though living in exile in England, could only work on the film in secret. Death Railway: History of the Bridge on The River Kwai Although the obvious link was by sea, Allied submarines controlling the region made it too treacherous. The year: 1943. River Kwai (Kanchanaburi): All You Need to Know BEFORE You Go - Tripadvisor THE BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI takes place in Japan-occupied Siam (later Thailand) in 1943, after the Imperial Japanese Empire has conquered vast territories of Asia. The Bridge on the River Kwai was selected in 1997 for preservation in the National Film Registry. [11] Guinness admitted that Lean "didn't particularly want me" for the role, and thought about immediately returning to England when he arrived in Ceylon and Lean reminded him that he wasn't the first choice. 28. . The movie was mainly filmed in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) and also in England. The Bridge Over the River Kwai. Spiegel had it refurbished completely and then had one mile of railway track laid for it. For one sunset scene, David Lean specifically traveled 150 miles to capture it. The Bridge on the River Kwai is now widely recognized as one of the greatest films ever made. 19. And a bloke called George Siegatz[29] an expert whistlerbegan to whistle Colonel Bogey, and a hit was born.". It was the highest-grossing film of 1957 in the United States and Canada and was also the most popular film at the British box office that year. While every effort has been made to follow citation style rules, there may be some discrepancies. 's working to build and/or destroy a bridge for the Japanese during World War II. The ending of that was sort of the story of life. He created the railroad. Lets find out. The movie is based on the novel Le Pont de la Riviere Kwai by Pierre Boulle. Two labour forces, one based in Siam and the other in Burma, worked from opposite ends of the line towards the centre. The movie garnered seven Academy Awards, including that for best picture, as well as three Golden Globe Awards and four BAFTA awards. After the final scene was shot, producer Sam Spiegel shipped the movie footage on five different planes to minimize the risk of loss. On 16 October 1943, the two ends of the Burma-Thailand railway were joined at Konkoita in Thailand. She retired Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. The Bridge on the River Kwai is a 1957 British-American epic war movie directed by David Lean and starring William Holden, Jack Hawkins, and Alec Guinness, featuring Sessue Hayakawa. Work on the bridge proceeds badly, due to both the faulty Japanese engineering plans and the prisoners' slow pace and deliberate sabotage. The Bridge on the River Kwai: Fact and fiction - Sentinelassam 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 . Allied soldiers had built a church and a hospital on the site where the cemetery now sits. Bridge On The River Kwai, The (original Version) - Trailer - YouTube 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. [49] Mike Kaplan, reviewing for Variety, described it as "a gripping drama, expertly put together and handled with skill in all departments. Saito leaves the officers standing all day in the intense heat. Writers: Pierre Boulle (novel), Carl Foreman and Michael Wilson (screenplay), Academy Award nominations (* denotes win), https://www.britannica.com/topic/The-Bridge-on-the-River-Kwai-film-by-Lean, Filmsite - The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), BFI Screenonline - The Bridge on the River Kwai, Turner Classic Movies - The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957). Use features like bookmarks, note taking and highlighting while reading The Bridge On The River Kwai Trivia: Fun And Interesting . 3. It stars Alec Guinness, Sessue Hayakawa, Jack Hawkins and William Holden. Death Railway was bombed heavily by the Allies from 1943 onwards. In a prison camp, British POWs are forced into labor. Vital equipment that would normally have been shipped through the canal had to be flown out to the location instead. David Lean's classic 1957 World War II movie Bridge on the River Kwai depicted the horrors endured by the Allied prisoners of war (POWs) forced to build the Thailand-Burma railway by the Japanese Imperial Army. This was an incorrect assumption. Geoffrey Horne saved his life. He insisted that Lean add a scene where Shears, the American played by William Holden, cozies up to a nurse (Ann Sears). 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. The Bridge Over the River Kwai won seven Academy Awards (including Best Picture) in 1958. 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. In 1942 Japan seized Myanmar from British control and quickly decided to build a rail link to Thailand in order to maintain a secure supply route to their forces. [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. In early 1943, a contingent of British prisoners of war, led by Lt. To learn more about the men behind the real story of the Bridge on the River Kwai, and to discover the casualties, please use our Find War Dead tool. US Navy Commander Shears tells of the horrific conditions. Thousands of Asian workers and POWs (prisoners of war) died while working on the project. 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. Where Is the River Kwai Located? - The Bridge on the River Kwai Thanbyuzayat is in Myanmar. [3] Since it was not a documentary, there are many historical inaccuracies in the film, as noted by eyewitnesses to the building of the real Burma Railway by historians.[30][31][32][33]. River Kwai Bridge | TakeMeTour The movie starring William Holden, Alec Guinness and Jack Hawkins was shot at more than 1 locations. The filming of the bridge explosion was to be done on 10 March 1957, in the presence of S.W.R.D. 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. To keep costs down, producer Sam Spiegel decided not to hire any extras, using crew members and Ceylon locals instead. Toosey was very different from Nicholson and was certainly not a collaborator who felt obliged to work with the Japanese. Despite the discomfort the rest of the crew were experiencing, Lean was thrilled about the shoot and never complained about his living conditions. Forced labourers were labourers taken from the populations of Japan-conquered territories. Tooseys men stated this never happened. [16], Director David Lean clashed repeatedly with his cast members, particularly Guinness and James Donald, who thought the novel was anti-British. The bridges were quickly repaired with the use of POW labour from the camp at Tha . He was contracted for $150,000 to be paid in installments. At one point during filming, David Lean nearly drowned when he was swept away by a river current. Return trains are 12.55 and 15.15. Lean had a lengthy row with Guinness over how to play the role of Nicholson; the actor wanted to play the part with a sense of humour and sympathy, while Lean thought Nicholson should be "a bore." The adventure war film The Bridge on the River Kwai may have swept the board of awards and attracted acclaim as one best films of the 20th century, but the War Office was very nervous "it would . Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). A temporary wooden bridge was completed at the beginning of 1943 and a few months later the steel bridge (which can be seen today) was finished. They built a railway to link Bangkok to Rangoon. Some sections, such as the infamous Hellfire Pass, required carving through tough sheer rock. 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. 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. The Bridge On The River Kwai Trivia: Fun And Interesting Facts About Then he hired Lean to directand Lean didn't like Foreman's version. They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. 15- "All work and no play make Jack a dull boy.". 4. In 1997, the film was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry by the United States Library of Congress. - Colonel Saito, 'The Bridge on the River Kwai '. There's a stench of death about you. Take a look below for 28 more fun and interesting facts about The Bridge on the River Kwai. The destruction of the bridge as depicted in the film is also entirely fictional. Major Warden of SOE invites Shears to join a commando mission to destroy the bridge just as it is completed. During its construction, approximately 13,000 prisoners of war died and were buried along the railway. It worked. The two did not collaborate on the script; Wilson took over after Lean was dissatisfied with Foreman's work. The British soldiers were slaves; they did not help the Japanese. He also didn't like hearing that he was Lean's second choice for the role, a fact made more awkward when he arrived in Ceylon and Lean greeted him with, "Of course, you know I really wanted Charles Laughton." Bought 4 and 6 mm dowel wood for bridge piers. He joined up in 1940 and served in the Middle East with the 2/2nd Pioneer Battalion before transferring back to the Dutch East Indies in early 1942. [61][62], In 1972, the movie was among the first selection of films released on the early Cartrivision video format, alongside classics such as The Jazz Singer and Sands of Iwo Jima. The film was based on the 1952 novel Bridge over the River Kwai by Pierre Boulle. BRIDGE ON RIVER KWAI - Shore Leave - Model Ship World Have a question about us or our work? The Bridge on the River Kwai is a classic 1957 British-American war film based upon the 1952 novel Le Pont de la Rivire Kwai by Pierre Boulle. 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. The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) is an epic World War II adventure/action, anti-war drama. 17. He was listed as missing in action in June 1943. [48], Bosley Crowther of The New York Times praised the film as "a towering entertainment of rich variety and revelation of the ways of men". The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) - IMDb Goering ABC, sponsored by Ford, paid a record $1.8 million for the television rights for two screenings in the United States. The movie was filmed in Ceylon, which is now Sri Lanka. The movie won seven Academy Awards, one for Best Picture. "[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. British English: The Top 50 Most Beautiful British Insults, British Slang: Your Guide to British Police Slang for the Telly Watcher, British Slang: Tea Time British Words for Tea and Tea Related Culture, ltimate List of Funny British Place Names, 101 Budget Britain Travel Tips 2nd Edition, Great Britons Book: Top 50 Greatest Brits Who Ever Lived, Anglotopias Grand Adventure Lands End to John OGroats.
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