Writer/director James Clavell swung for the fence and missed in this Thirty-Years War epic.* What was that one about again? Germany. Post-Reformation. Protestant majority largely governed by the Catholic minority. Tiny feudal States in futile conflict. Rampant pillaging. Proliferating Protestant sects unable to unite. That’s the idea. But in one hidden valley, life is nearly unchanged. Thanks to nature’s annual snow blockade, the town cut off from war’s calamities Enter wandering teacher/intellectual Omar Sharif: hungry, hunted, finding paradise. Soon followed by Michael Caine’s Captain, pragmatic warrior of little conviction. Reasoning Yin meets Weaponized Yang as the little town tries to keep a balance of power between fervently religious peasants, horny troops with weapons, and ruling church & secular leaders. Clavell wasn’t wrong, it is interesting stuff, but only Caine’s disdain toward conviction feels internally dramatized. Everything else checked off thru suspiciously modern sounding speech. (Clavell no G.B. Shaw. Try SAINT JOAN to hear the difference.) Worse, Clavell hasn’t the filmmaking chops to get us past the dramatic & character lacunae. Why so little on that wintry pastorale? It's the heart of the matter. Nonetheless, simply putting these ideas out there enough to keep the film in the conversation long enough for it to develop a well deserved cult following.
ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: *Clavell never directed another feature, turning to a big novel that touched on some of the same outsider views of internecine war: SHOGUN/’80; ‘24.
DOUBLE-BILL: Adapted and directed by Bryan Forbes, Clavell’s semi-autobiographical POW novel, KING RAT/’65, remains impressive, possibly his best on film.
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