10 facts about the bridge on the river kwai

12. 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 . [39], The major railway bridge described in the novel and film did not actually cross the river known at the time as the Kwai. Around the time that he was offered the movie, David Lean had little money, as he was in the middle of a financially ruinous divorce, and was very much in need of a new project. The site's critical consensus reads, "This complex war epic asks hard questions, resists easy answers, and boasts career-defining work from star Alec Guinness and director David Lean. 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 conditions to which POW and civilian labourers were subjected were far worse than the film depicted. 7. Return trains are 12.55 and 15.15. 5. It would be a massive undertaking. However, cameraman Freddy Ford was unable to get out of the way of the explosion in time, and Lean had to stop filming. In the movie the bridge is destroyed by commandos. When he asks for Saitos help in cutting the wires, the hidden commando, Lieutenant Joyce (Geoffrey Horne), leaps up and kills Saito. Both writers had to work in secret, as they were on the Hollywood blacklist and had fled to England in order to continue working. Our editors will review what youve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. But whats the real story? During World War II, British soldiers added lyrics to the tune that went approximately along these lines: Hitler David Lean was completely at home in the hot and humid Ceylon jungle. 1. The movie garnered seven Academy Awards, including that for best picture, as well as three Golden Globe Awards and four BAFTA awards. By the end, prisoners working on the rail route werent calling it the Burma-Siam Railway. The United States Army Air Force (USAAF) was the first to conduct air raids on the bridges over the River Kwai between November 1944 and January 1945. It was filmed in Kitulgala which is 60 . Bridge Over The River Kwai Address: Tha Makham, Kanchanaburi, Thailand. Lean wanted Charles Laughton (who'd starred in his 1954 film Hobson's Choice) to play Colonel Nicholson, the role that ultimately went to Alec Guinness. Chungkai War Cemetery is something of a sister site to Kanchanaburi. These problems resulted in a number of anomalies that were very difficult to correct, like a ghosting effect in many scenes that resembles colour mis-registration, and a tick-like effect with the image jumping or jerking side-to-side. Kwai River Bridge history. It is close to, but not over the country's border with Myanmar. A real train rode over the bridge as it blew up. While the British prisoners celebrate their accomplishment that night, the commandoes wire the bridge with explosives to be detonated by a plunger operated by a hidden soldier, timed to collapse the bridge just as an inaugural train carrying Japanese dignitaries is crossing it. But the unusual move paid off for ABCthe telecast drew huge ratings with a record audience of 72 million[60] and a Nielsen rating of 38.3 and an audience share of 61%. He wanders into a Burmese village, is nursed back to health, and eventually reaches the British colony of Ceylon. Have a question about us or our work? Allied soldiers had built a church and a hospital on the site where the cemetery now sits. Reviews There are no reviews yet. Best time to visit Bridge Over The River Kwai (preferred time): 09:00 am - 01:00 pm. [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. The Bridge on the River Kwai was widely praised, winning seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture, at the 30th Academy Awards. FIFTY years ago waves of Liberator bombers were deliberately destroying a remarkable feat of engineering. His compassion and insistence on equality amongst the ranks ensured he protected his men as best he could. It was 425 feet long, 90 feet high, and cost $52,085 out of the film's $2 million budget. Thanbyuzayat is in Myanmar. But in 1966, the film aired on American . Also, the dense surrounding jungle renders escape virtually impossible. The place: Japanese prisoner-of-war camp in Burma. (Spiegel got a British military adviser to help with that side of things, too.). This way, he remained oblivious to the real nature of his characters fate. He served as an adviser during the making of the movie. Although the obvious link was by sea, Allied submarines controlling the region made it too treacherous. Toosey would provide the inspiration for Lt. Col Nicholson portrayed by Alec Guinness in the 1957 film. See details. The film was based on the 1952 novel Bridge over the River Kwai by Pierre Boulle. It also won the BAFTA Award for Best British Screenplay. Take a look below for 28 more fun and interesting facts about The Bridge on the River Kwai. Geoffrey Horne saved his life. Tooseys men stated this never happened. Thanbyuzayat was originally a POW administration headquarters and base camp. Spiegel finally sent Michael Wilson to Ceylon (now Sri Lanka), where Lean was in pre-production, and the two worked together to hammer out the final version. By 1944, its operational capacity was being massively hampered by the damage caused by air raids. A Smith article describes bridge on River Kwai, near Kanchanaburi, Thailand, built by Allied POWs during Japanese occupation of Thailand in World War II and subject of famous film The Bridge on . Pay on the train. The prisoners of war who had . Despite the nightmarish conditions, and equipped only with the most basic of tools, the POWs pulled off an amazing feat of engineering. [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". Witnessing the carnage, Clipton shakes his head and mutters, "Madness! The line passing through the scenic Three Pagodas Pass runs for 250 miles. Following the raids, Thanbyuzayat was evacuated. 2023 Commonwealth War Graves Commission. Train crossing the wooden bridge which spanned the Mae Klong River (renamed Kwai Yai River in 1960). 2. The bridge they build will become a symbol of service and survival to one prisoner, Colonel Nicholson, a proud perfectionist. 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. During the cutting of Hellfire Pass, for example, 69 men were beaten to death across a twelve-week period. These issues, running throughout the film, were addressed to a lesser extent on various previous DVD releases of the film and might not have been so obvious in standard definition.[67]. While the story is fiction, the broader setting--including the construction of the Burmese railway--is based on historical events. As the train approaches, they hurry down to the riverbank to investigate. Or maybe you have a story for us or would like to work together. US $4.49 Standard Shipping from outside US. [40], The Bridge on the River Kwai was a massive commercial success. This article is part of our Classic Film Throwback series - By Sam Hendrian - "Madness. (He didn't attend the Oscars, either.) Nicholson spots the wire and brings it to Saito's attention. Construction of the Burma-Siam railway began in October 1942 and would end in October 1943. Only in 1984 did the Academy rectify the situation by retroactively awarding the Oscar to Foreman and Wilson, posthumously in both cases. 2023 Minute Media - All Rights Reserved. Read the response of the CWGC to the findings of the Special Committee. 25 March 1995. The Bridge Over the River Kwai won seven Academy Awards (including Best Picture) in 1958. Leadership Analysis: The Bridge On The River Kwai. 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. (Lean denied ever wanting Laughton for the role, despite abundant documented evidence to the contrary.). Neither of them got credit, though, as The Bridge on the River Kwai was released during the three-year period when people who'd ever been Communists (or who refused to answer questions about it before Congress) were ineligible for Academy Awards. The deaths of the Asian workers and the prisoners were real events, but most of the book and the movie are not true. But he'd never made anything on an epic scale, wasn't well known outside of England, and wouldn't have been considered for The Bridge on the River Kwai if it weren't for Katharine Hepburn, the star of his 1955 film Summertime. 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. The Suez Canal crisis of 1956 badly affected production. The US was beginning to control the sea lanes, making it increasingly difficult for Japanese shipborne cargo to reach the army dotted across the Pacific. Has no balls It was the highest-grossing film of 1957 and received overwhelmingly positive reviews from critics. Carl Foreman and Michael Wilson have written the screenplay for this film. John Coast, a young British officer who went on to become a successful filmmaker who spent three and half years as a Japanese POW, said: As nobody should ever have need telling, the picture is a load of high-toned codswallop.. Camps were set up at 100-metre intervals. 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The classic story of English POWs in Burma forced to build a bridge to aid the war effort of their Japanese captors. They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. Mortally wounded, he falls onto the plunger, the bridge is blown up, and the train with the dignitaries falls into the river. All Rights Reserved. Some Japanese viewers resented the movie's depiction of their engineers' capabilities as inferior and less advanced than they were in reality. She spent most of the next 42 years working as a copy editor and editor at Encyclopaedia Britannica. Work on the bridge proceeds badly, due to both the faulty Japanese engineering plans and the prisoners' slow pace and deliberate sabotage. Want to work for the CWGC? "The Bridge on the River Kwai" was set in 1942, shortly after the fall of Singapore. The cemetery itself is located just outside the town of Kanchanaburi at the point where the Kwai splits into the Mae Khlong and Kwai Noi rivers. They remain standing at attention throughout the day. [19], Guinness later said that he subconsciously based his walk while emerging from "the Oven" on that of his eleven-year-old son Matthew,[20] who was recovering from polio at the time, a disease that left him temporarily paralyzed from the waist down. At their head was Lieutenant-Colonel Phillip Toosey. This records the names of 11 Indian army men buried in Muslim cemeteries throughout Thailand whose graves could not be maintained. [40] Boulle had never been to the bridge. The real Bridge over the River Kwai is bridge 277 of the Burma-Siam Railway. [38] Some Japanese viewers also disliked the film for portraying the Allied prisoners of war as more capable of constructing the bridge than the Japanese engineers themselves were, accusing the filmmakers of being unfairly biased and unfamiliar with the realities of the bridge construction, a sentiment echoed by surviving prisoners of war who saw the film in cinemas. The Bridge on the River Kwai. In 1984 the Academy Board of Governors voted posthumous Oscars to Foreman and Wilson, and their names were included on prints of the film beginning in the 1990s. He described the music for The Bridge on the River Kwai as the "worst job I ever had in my life" from the point of view of time. [50] William Holden was also credited for his acting for giving a solid characterization that was "easy, credible and always likeable in a role that is the pivot point of the story". Image: British troops surrender at Singapore. Although the film uses the historical setting of the construction of the Burma Railway in 19421943, the plot and characters of Boulle's novel and the screenplay are almost entirely fictional. Cutting the base board 1190 x 160 x 12 mm. Bought 4 and 6 mm dowel wood for bridge piers. Guinness, however, had his own reservations. Nicholson's obsession with the bridge eventually drives him to allow his officers to volunteer to engage in manual labor. [27] Gavin Young[28] recounts meeting Donald Wise, a former prisoner of the Japanese who had worked on the Burma Railway. The Bridge On The River Kwai is the World War II Oscar winner about an Army colonel (Alec Guinness) obsessed with proving British superiority over his Japanese captors by showing that his . The bridge is still in everyday use as part of the Bangkok-Nam Tok line. Lamb, as he was known, had been a politician before calling up, serving the state legislature in Victoria, Australia. One of the iconic war films of its time, the Bridge on the River Kwai has shone a spotlight on POWs suffering. 28. Chungkai was also a POW worker base camp. An example of this is when commandos Warden and Joyce hunt a fleeing Japanese soldier through the jungle, desperate to prevent him from alerting other troops. WILLIAM HOLDEN JACK HAWKINS 1957 BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI 8X10 PHOTO. This was an entertaining story. When Joyce is wounded by Japanese fire, Shears swims across, but is himself shot. Aerial reconnaissance photo of the Steel Bridge taken during a bombing raid. This meant that some of the British prisoners were actually natives of the region wearing make-up to appear Caucasian. Carl Foreman was the initial screenwriter, but Lean replaced him with Michael Wilson. 10. That evening, the officers are placed in a punishment hut, while Nicholson is beaten and locked in an iron box. 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. Log in. This was an incorrect assumption. 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. rainy day Therefore, there are not many people. With William Holden, Alec Guinness, Jack Hawkins, Sessue Hayakawa. The Bridge on the River Kwai. Construction began before anyone had been cast. Boulle drew on the experiences of Far East POWs building the now infamous Burma-Siam Railway, linking modern-day Myanmar and Thailand to create his work. Sessue Hayakawa considered his performance as Saito as the highlight of his career. The ending of that was sort of the story of life. Mitch Miller had a hit with a recording of both marches. 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. He, Shears, and Joyce reach the river in time with the assistance of Siamese women bearers and their village chief, Khun Yai. Lean and his production designer, Donald Ashton, were in Ceylon months ahead of time to construct the film's title character (the bridge, not the river). Servicemen who survived the death marches, appalling working conditions, and savage treatment by their guards thought the film nor book reflected the realities of their experience. [22], Lean nearly drowned when he was swept away by the river current during a break from filming.[23]. Disease was a huge killer among railway workers, but so was brutality. This Week's Toybox is . He created the railroad. Although the Death Railway has never again reached the Myanmar border, a shorter stretch was reopened by Thailand's railway authorities between 1949 and 1958, and trains on this modern-day line cross the infamous Bridge on the River Kwai. Join us in an act of virtual remembrance and remember those who made the ultimate sacrifice. 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. Then he hired Lean to directand Lean didn't like Foreman's version. [Ronald Searle, To the Kwai and Back: War drawings 1939-45, London, Collins, 1986, 104] 'The Bridge on the River Kwai' is now the best-known site on the Burma-Thailand railway but its fame is due more to a fictional film than its significance in World War II. Use our postcode search tool to discover more about the war dead from your local area. Showing the impact of disease on the workforce, Kanchanaburi contains two graves holding the ashes of 300 Cholera victims. 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. Sessue Hayakawa really did accidentally strike Alec Guinness hard enough to draw blood in one scene. The Bridge on the River Kwai is a British 1957 movie from Columbia Pictures, based on Pierre Boulle's 1952 book The Bridge over the River Kwai (French: Le Pont de la Rivire Kwai). Thousands of Asian workers and POWs (prisoners of war) died while working on the project. Colonel Nicholson, arrive at a Japanese prison camp in Thailand. train on the bridge over the river kwai in kanchanaburi, thailan - bridge over the river kwai stock pictures, royalty-free photos & images FLOATING HOUSES ON THE RIVER KWAI, KANCHANABURI, THAILAND. [13], Many directors were considered for the project, among them John Ford, William Wyler, Howard Hawks, Fred Zinnemann, and Orson Welles (who was also offered a starring role). 's working to build and/or destroy a bridge for the Japanese during World War II. The train crashed into a generator on the other side of the bridge and was wrecked. At the end of the day, the officers are imprisoned, and Nicholson is thrown into the ovena small box made of corrugated metal. comment. Prior to casting Alec Guinness, Sam Spiegel tried to persuade Spencer Tracy to play the part of Colonel Nicholson. His first epic was his twelfth film: The Bridge on the River Kwai, starring Alec Guinness and William Holden as P.O.W. When Columbia Pictures read the script for Kwai, it was concerned that the story was too much about men and had no love interest. The screenplay was instead credited to the novelist, Boullewhich was quite a feat, since he didnt speak or read English. 60,000 or so Allied prisoners of war, including British, Australian, Dutch and some US troops, alongside more than 200,000 civilian labourers were pressed into service. As shown in the movie, Guinness played the scene without flinching. - Colonel Saito, 'The Bridge on the River Kwai '. Despite this, he won an Oscar and a Grammy. In 1941 the Japanese Army invaded Thailand. Wrote Guinness: "I felt like turning around and getting back on the plane and paying my own fare home!" He was listed as missing in action in June 1943. Harry Cohn, the vulgar (but successful) man who ran Columbia Pictures at the time, was furious when he read the script and saw no love interest. They would work in appalling conditions, given minuscule amounts of food, snatches of sleep, and little to no medical treatment. [30], A 1969 BBC television documentary, Return to the River Kwai, made by former POW John Coast,[33] sought to highlight the real history behind the film (partly through getting ex-POWs to question its factual basis, for example Dr Hugh de Wardener and Lt-Col Alfred Knights), which angered many former POWs. Toosey later defended him in his war crimes trial after the war, and the two became friends. Clipton objects, believing this to be collaboration with the enemy. The Bridge on the River Kwai is now widely recognized as one of the greatest films ever made. The story is fictional but uses the construction of the Burma Railway, in 1942-1943, as its historical setting, and is partly based on Pierre Boulle's own life experience working in Malaysia rubber . Wise: "I never heard it in Thailand. [63], The film was restored in 1985 by Columbia Pictures. In 1957 the movie, The Bridge on the River Kwai, premiered in London and became the biggest grossing film of 1958, winning seven academy awards in the process, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Musical Score, Best Cinematography and Best Editing.Not bad for a movie that is largely a work of almost entirely fictional characters and a story which . The Colonel Bogey March" was composed in 1914 by Kenneth Alford, a military band conductor. [34] According to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission: The notorious Burma-Siam railway, built by Commonwealth, Dutch and American prisoners of war, was a Japanese project driven by the need for improved communications to support the large Japanese army in Burma. Everywhere in the jungle, the graveyards made their appearance; starting in a small way they gradually grew bigger, until when the railway was completed at the end of the year, thousands of bodies lay in the jungle from one end to the other.. Boulle nonetheless enjoyed the film version though he disagreed with its climax. c. 1945. The surviving sections stand as monuments to the men who suffered so much to build them. [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. Subsequent releases of the film finally gave them proper screen credit. The movie is based on the novel "Le Pont de la Riviere Kwai" by Pierre Boulle. 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). THE HEAD OF COLUMBIA PICTURES FORCED LEAN TO ADD A LOVE SCENE. British and American intelligence officers conspire . "[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. American casualties were repatriated back to the United States. Get information about our funding, our Customer Charter and our Strategic Plan. To enjoy Thailand River cruises, you need to understand a little about the geography of Thailand and its river system. Alec Guiness, William Holden, and Jack Hawkins in front of bridge they built in a scene from the film 'The Bridge On The River Kwai', 1957. Only minor damage was inflicted. Explore the CWGC Archive through our online portal. The Bridge on the River Kwai is a work of fiction, but borrows the construction of the Burma Railway in 1942 to 1943 for its historical setting. The key sites containing Thailand and Burma war graves related to Death Railway and the Bridge on the River Kwai are: Kanchanaburi War Cemetery is located a short distance from the former Kanburi POW camp. Lean wanted to use the tune in Kwai, figured those lyrics wouldn't pass the censors (or the approval of the composer's widow), and opted to have the troops whistle it instead. [55] Slant stated that "the 1957 epic subtly develops its themes about the irrationality of honor and the hypocrisy of Britain's class system without ever compromising its thrilling war narrative", and in comparing to other films of the time said that Bridge on the River Kwai "carefully builds its psychological tension until it erupts in a blinding flash of sulfur and flame. Of course, he could not save many of his men from expiring, but he did their best to make conditions more comfortable. 15. After Saito cuts a ceremonial ribbon, Nicholson spots a detonator wire. The real swamps in Ceylon were deemed to be too dangerous. Warden responds that he already knew and that the US Navy had agreed to transfer him to the British SOE with the simulated rank of Major to avoid embarrassment. One of a number of Allied POW"s . The negative itself manifested many of the kinds of issues one would expect from a film of this vintage: torn frames, embedded emulsion dirt, scratches through every reel, colour fading. They were supported by an unknown number of Malaysian labourers. The screenplay was based on French author Pierre Boulle"s 1954 novel of the same name.