What a film! It packs a punch even today and one can just imagine what a morale booster it would have been to the war effort for England. Carol Reed as always is top notch in direction and the portrayals by David Niven, Stanley Holloway and in a very small role Peter Ustinov not necessarily in that order is remarkable. Niven I am given to understand was lent out by the army to make this movie which was incidentally scripted by a very young Ustinov. The narrative is simple yet effective. It brings about the story of a collection of men from various parts of British society drafted into the infantry, undergoing training and being bombed out of a troop carrier in the Mediterranean and then being baptised by fire in North Africa after El-Alamein. Top class to say the least. The standouts are the sceptical old-timers who keep following the progress of the war from 1939 to 1942(when the film ends) in the newspapers with their cryptic criticism about the regiment of which they were a part earlier, but in the final scene are obviously impressed by the regiments performance. Reed sees to it that there is no dialogue in this scene but just a close up of the old-timers recording their admiration and approval - Excellent. The final scene where the trainee soldiers fit their bayonets and prepare to attack into the mist is another Reed masterpiece.
Review of The Way Ahead
