Simon B

Watched this film again recently and it has worn well. The acting is brilliant and nice to see old favourites like Duncan Macrae and Denis Price. The facts of the story are largely told in the reviews below but current conventions provide some interesting perspectives. For example, the Alec Guinness character is obviously a bully whose behaviour, both towards his own men and his mistress and daughter, would hardly be tolerated today. On the other hand the John Mills character appears to be suffering from PTSD, having spent several years as a PoW, presumably in the Far East. He was even tortured by water-boarding which somehow I thought was a relatively modern invention. So it is the psychology of the story as much as anything which is thought provoking and perhaps a reflection of the misfortunes of war.