Review of Paths of Glory (1957) by Hunter D — 10 Apr 2011

An underrated film that doesn't often get discussed when people bring up Stanley Kubrick, in fact, the word "underrated" is a bit of an understatement, as PATHS OF GLORY is a masterpiece. Kirk Douglas stars as a French Colonel who is given the task of defending a quartet of men set to be unjustly court-martialed for exhibiting supposed "cowaradice" during what was essentially a suicide attack on a German fortress.

PATHS OF GLORY is often described as one of the greatest anti-war films, however I wouldn't say that the movie is anti-war, so much as it is anti-beaurocracy, as the film's villain, General Mireau (played with mustache-twirling efficiency by George Macready), views his soldiers as nothing more than expendible pawns and not as human beings. The coldest moment is when he orders his own men to shoot their fellow soldiers who aren't advancing at a rate that pleases him. Of course, his men refuse, but this only outrages him more, leading to the trial and subsequent execution the film leads towards.

The film's disdain for the cold cruelty of military beurocracy doesn't necessaily make it an anti-war film. For a film to be truly anti-war, it must not place any importance on the idea of military service. A few examples include Terence Malick's THE THIN RED LINE, which views military service with a detatched ambivalence, or Kubrick's FULL METAL JACKET, which expresses outright disdain towards the idea of soldiering. PATHS OF GLORY, however, directly deals with the ideas of what it means to be an honorable soldier. These are interesting themes that the movie explores with brilliance and brevity, but it prevents it from being what I would consider an "anti-war film." If anything, it's a movie that examines how the bigwigs making decisions in the ivory towers often forget that they're dealing with real people on the ground, and urges them to respect the lives of the men fighting for their country.

(Also, please don't misunderstand, I'm not expressing any kind of disdain and/or hatred towards the idea of being a soldier, I'm simply stating what does or does not make a film "anti-war." Believe me, soldiers are made of stronger stuff than I am!).