New Releases The Railway Man

CUSTOMER REVIEW



"The Railway Man" is the dramatization of the memoir of British Army Lieutenant Eric Lomax, captured by the Japanese at the fall of Singapore in 1942, forced to work on the Burma-Thailand "death" railroad along with thousands of his fellow POWs, and made to endure privation and torture at the hands of his brutal Japanese captors. Colin Firth stars as the elder Lomax, whom we meet in middle age, beginning a new marriage and still suffering from acute PTSD. His wife (well-played by Nicole Kidman) is determined to end his suffering. She worms the story of his wartime experiences out of Lomax's former commanding officer Findley, played in the present by Skellan Skarsgard and in the past by Sam Reid. Lomax eventually undertakes a journey to Thailand to confront his past. The lives of the older and younger Lomax are played out in parallel, in a story that is so emotion-charged as to be very tough to watch.



The location shooting in Scotland, and in Thailand is extremely good, as is the recreation of the wartime death railway. A superb performance by Jeremy Irvine as the heroic younger Lomax is matched by the nuanced acting of Hiroyuki Sanada and Tanro Ishida as the older and younger versions of the Japanese Kempetai officer who tortured Lomax. The alignment of the music score and the story is so flawless as to make you forget it's presence. The pacing of the storyline is excellent, as the scenes shift back and forth from Scotland to the Far East and from past to present. The ending is something you have to see. This movie had only a short theater engagement in the United States, competing against the usual summer blockbusters. It is worth tracking down on DVD and is highly recommended.