The Railway Man
Directed by Jonathan Teplitzy
Written by Frank Cottrell Boyce, Eric Lomax and Andy Paterson and based on an adaptation of the bestselling autobiography of the same name by Eric Lomax
116 minutes
UK release date 12 January 2014
Stars Colin Firth, Nicole Kidman, Jeremy Irvine, Stellan Skarsgård, Tanroh Ishida, Hiroyuki Sanada
Review by Susan Meehan
The Railway Man is a powerful film based on Eric Lomax’s book of the same name, featuring particularly wonderful performances by Colin Firth and Jeremy Irvine as, respectively, the young and older Eric Lomax. Nicole Kidman playing Patti, Lomax’s second wife, exceeded my low expectations of her for this role.
Fittingly, love blossoms between devoted rail enthusiast Eric and Patti on a train. It seems orchestrated by fate as Eric has only caught that particular train by figuring out an alternative route home as a result of his scheduled train having been delayed.
Eric and Patti end up getting married. Far from being an idyllic marriage, Patti soon becomes aware of Eric’s sudden rages, mood swings, abrupt withdrawal of affection and unexpected annoyance at incorrect bills and other such trifles. She realises that Eric is periodically tormented with memories of the horrific torture he faced at the hands of his Japanese captors during World War Two.
Eric, a former signals engineer in the British army, is unable to tell Patti of the horrors he endured as a Prisoner of War of the Japanese, captured after the fall of Singapore in 1942 and forced to work on the infamous Thai-Burma Railway.
In flashbacks we see how Eric, aided by a group of fellow POWs who scout for the necessary electrical parts, manages to build a radio. Able to hear BBC news reports, the POWs discover that Germany and Japan are in retreat and that the UK is holding out. This gives them the courage and hope to hang on to their lives.
The Japanese captors, on finding the device, mercilessly beat one of Lomax’s group. At this point Lomax carefully takes off his glasses and selflessly offers himself up for torture.
These torture scenes, offered as flashbacks, are harrowing and remind the viewer of the unimaginable torment to which the POWs were subjected. Having read the book, I was aware that Eric’s torture went on for two years but this is not made clear in the film. While difficult to watch at times, the full horrors of the torture are more fully disclosed in the book. I found that the lingering psychological effects which the beatings had on Eric, were even more distressing than the actual physical torture itself as depicted in the film.
It is unsurprising that Eric experiences frequent meltdowns as a result of his memories. Patti feels useless as she cannot get through to Eric despite her attempts at coaxing him. She manages, however, to elicit some details about Eric’s suffering and war experiences from Finlay, a fellow former POW and friend of Eric.
The story builds up to a climax as Finlay receives a newspaper article about Takashi Nagase, the interpreter who, over 30 years earlier, had been attached to the Japanese secret police and who had liaised between Eric’s group of POWs and the Japanese unit officers who tortured them and forced them to work on the railway. Nagase is alive and working at a Burma Railway museum.
Encouraged by Finlay to seek revenge on their behalf, Lomax sets off to visit the museum and Nagase, whom he has never forgotten and also held guilty for being complicit in his torture.
The denouement is certainly spectacular, and as with other parts of the film veers from the truth, primarily for dramatic effect.
The Railway Man is a sensitively made film depicting the horrors of war. Desperately sad, it ultimately delivers the message of forgiveness. It features fine performances. Jeremy Irvine is a fabulous young Lomax, having skilfully captured Colin Firth’s mannerisms and way of speaking.
Firth beautifully captures Lomax’s torment, much in the same way as he did when playing another complex, fragile and wounded character, George in the 2009 film, A Single Man. Nagase is played well by both Tanroh Ishida and Hiroyuki Sanada.
Patti is a supportive wife who is eventually successful in helping Eric deal with this past. The character is un-showy and Kidman does not steal the film in any way. On Francine Stock’s The Film Programme (12 January 2014) on Radio 4, Frank Cottrell Boyce, the screenwriter, amusingly recounted that on seeing the film, the real Patti said that she had never been as dowdy Kidman portrays her in the film.
There are a few touches of humour in the film, mainly when Lomax is shown enthusing about trains.
Those interested in the film would also be advised to read the poignant book as Cottrell Boyce has taken liberties with Lomax’s story. While the book mainly focuses on Eric’s experiences as a POW, the film is based more solidly in the present and centres on Eric’s second marriage to Patti, with flashbacks to the torture scenes. The film’s ending is also radically different, but understandably so in order to raise the level of tension for the cinematic audience.
Tanroh Ishida who plays the young Nagase with tremendous sensitivity is an up and coming young actor to look out for.
Ishida was trained in Noh and Kyogen from the age of three. Moving to London at the age of 15, he studied at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.
You may have seen Tanroh Ishida at the 2013 Japan Matsuri in Trafalgar Square on 5 November performing as a special guest with the music band Jetsam.
As an insight into the horrors of World War Two, the vicissitudes of life and a testament to the redeeming power of love and forgiveness, this film really deserves to be watched!