This Movie Can Only Be Described With One Word.

everything you have heard about this movie is true.

Absolutely amazing

It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties.

If you're looking for a film that makes you feel as if you're suffering along with the protagonists, you have come to the right place. The frustration I felt while watching this film is a testament to the wonderful job of the filmmakers and actors to make the plight of the characters palpable. In my opinion, what is the point of making a film about the very boundaries of human suffering if you do not make the audience feel as if they are suffering along with the main characters? Here, my feeling of frustration began in the Soviet Gulag, which is decently depicted in this film. The audience gets a real sense of the crowding, lice and power structures that were an ever-present part of every concentration camp. I was personally impressed at the addition of Valka's character and the representation of the role that "career criminals" played in the camps as the most powerful men in every barrack, namely because of their ability to incite fear and thus get what they want. It was also nice to see the point raised that some detainees in the camp still supported communism. It is important to see this depicted in the film since it is historically accurate that even though these people were imprisoned by the government, they were still loyal to communism and what it stood for. Consequently, in terms of the films accuracy, I was very impressed for a film about the gulags, which are a highly underrepresented subject in Hollywood. If I could change anything I would have added more casualties to the gulag than were shown in the film. It almost makes the conditions of the camp and the brutality of the environment not look as harsh without the almost constant death that would have defined actual life in the gulags. The feeling of frustration continued as the group escaped and eventually made their way into the desert on the way to India. I kept feeling as if I wanted the scenes in the desert to end so that I would no longer feel the irritation that rose in me as I just watched them walk over miles and miles of desert. I realized later that this was a choice that the directors of the movie consciously made in an attempt to convey to the audience the real frustration and desperation of the characters. Though there is debate about whether or not this walk to freedom did occur, there is no denying that the walk made you feel the pure despair and hopelessness of the protagonists who would go to such lengths to avoid concentration camps. In this sense, I would recommend this film to anyone who is looking for a film about Soviet Gulags. Not only does it provide a painfully real representation of camp life, it conveys the shear desperation that led several men to take on this type of journey. What does it say about the camps that these men would be willing to walk across a continent to escape?

The beginning of the film contains the most valuable and accurate historical depictions. In the first scenes, we are shown how family members were coerced into informing on their spouses, or parents, through means of torture. The gulag system not only tore apart families by physical distance, but through emotional trauma as well. The guilt of being responsible for a loved one's imprisonment is imaginably as tormenting as the gulags were.The scenes that took place in the gulag showed the hostilities of Siberia's climate and the unforgiving nature of the criminal prisoners who ran the show much like the Kapos did in concentration camps. The film did well to highlight the different kinds of prisoners who ended up in the gulags, ranging from political prisoners, to convicts and even on the rare occasion, an American.As the escaping group got further from the gulag, the film became more and more about surviving in the wild than about a significant historical event. Of course there were people who escaped and many who met their end in the surrounding wilderness. But the 4,000 mile walk depicted seems to have been an unique exception or perhaps an impossible dream at best. The journey, though, illustrates what is better than being in a gulag. They were willing to risk the unknown in the wilderness rather than stay and die in the gulag as prisoners. The escaping group took ownership of their lives back, and for some, their deaths too.Purely as a film, it was a compelling story told in an engaging way. I appreciated the many different kinds of prisoners that had their characters expanded upon and a voice given too. Not often is a criminal prisoner seen as much more than a criminal, and I thought that Valka was a crucial character to the film.

"The Way Back" is certainly a wonderfully shot film, with beautiful landscapes and does a great job capturing the daunting terrain. The men who escaped from the Soviet Gulag in Siberia certainly had a journey cut out for them. With that being said, there were certain positives and negatives about the film. One, it had a sound portrayal of Gulag life. From the very beginning you see how quickly time in the camp is turned to savagery. Rations are hoarded or traded or stolen. All that matters is survival, rather, your own survival. There is certainly a camp hierarchy in place with the "criminals" calling the shots. This was a useful tactic that the guards employed in order to create fear and order within the barracks. The hard labor of the camps was also depicted well in the film. The labor of the Gulag was an imperative aspect that came with many dangers for the men. Any one caught not doing their job would be shot. We see close moments such as these in the film, especially when Jim Sturgess' has a moment of hallucination and tries to walk out of the mine. Life was grueling and difficult, with few moments of hope. "Mister Smith," Ed Harris' character sums it up well later in the film: "In the camps some saw death as freedom." Despite some of these positive aspects, the overall journey left me in disbelief. The whole thing was like the ten biblical plagues. One thing after another, I was surprised they weren't all dead sooner. That being said, there are questions about the veracity of the story itself as even though the film is supposed to be based on a true story, the 1956 memoir that it is based upon is heavily disputed. Yet the purpose of the journey was not entirely lost on the film. For one it gave us a reflection of Soviet life that we didn't see in the Soviet Union through the scene with the destroyed Buddhist monastery. This was a reflection of what life would have been like in Soviet Russia as the monastery was completely destroyed and desolate. Churches were demolished and priests were shot and taken to camps. Under the communist regime religion was banned, yet another aspect people found solace in taken away. Overall the film showcased an immense amount of strength on the part of the escapees and the struggles of maintaining hope. An interesting story whether fact or fiction.

The Way Back, directed by Peter Weir, tells the story of several Siberian gulag inmates and their escape to freedom. This film does a good job at what it was meant to do: entertain. Being able to follow the characters through their treacherous journey was exciting to watch, and sad to see so many likeable people die. In terms of an educational film on the horrors of the gulag, it did a very good job, though it was quite brief in comparison to the rest of the movie. The very first scene portrayed the feelings that many Russians felt upon being interned. The scene used a lot of minimalism, limiting the screen to 3 wide shots, one for each character. It felt almost disorienting for the audience. We have no perception of who these characters are, why this man is being accused, why his wife is seemingly betraying him, the sheer callousness of the guard as he refers to them as "accused" and "witness". This confusion was also felt by many inmates, as they were often interned for false, almost arbitrary reasons. The scenes within the camp were the highlight of the film as they were able to tell so much about life within these camps, with so little time spent there. Some noticeable sections that were displayed were the trade micro-economy that existed within these camps, demonstrated by the exchanges of cigarettes, meats, and clothing; the existence of a hierarchy ruled by the criminal class; and the presence of various prisoners forming groups based off of reason for internment, whether it was criminals or political internees. The cinematography was also especially strong within the camps. The extreme wide shots of the neighboring mountains truly portrayed the expanse and isolation of this camp. The fences were not the jail, the environment was. The shots demonstrated the impossibility of escape, and the hopelessness that the inmates felt. Inside of the mine was another highlight. The stage presence of smoke, falling rocks, and orange filters created a sense of exhaustion, claustrophobia, and disease, all of which were truly present in the mines. Working there was essentially a death sentence, and this concept was heavily felt. One noticeable flaw in the film was the lack of starvation within the inmates and those travelling. The makeup was well done and believable, but in terms of physicality, everyone looked pretty well fed. There was one scene where a man was begging for food, but that was the extent to which the hunger was shown. Overall though, this film was strongest in the beginning, but still fun to watch throughout.