Paths of Glory

This is flat out one of my favorite films. Everything in this is so good that I was blown away the first time I saw it in college. I immediately went to amazon and ordered the blu ray for my own collection. If you've never seen it, do it now.

The plot in this is great because we jump from sequence to sequence in a very logical, perfectly timed way. No, the whole movie does not take place on the front line. Instead we go through the whole process for what happens early on to see how it fully effects the soldiers. I get so furious every time I watch this at the dickhole characters.

Seriously, go watch this.

"People are composed of many things, and in my work, what influences me is the complexity of people - the chiaroscuro of dark and light. When I play a strong guy, I try to find, where is he weak? And, conversely, when I play a weak guy, where is he strong?"

Man, he truly lived life to the fullest.

The myth, the legend, the actor - Kirk Douglas.

Kirk was the last movie star of the golden age. Despite playing angry and often cruel main characters that can easily be unsympathetic if played by anyone else, but were always compelling to watch. A stroke of genuis and he did it in style. His dimpled chin and husky voice made him recognizable, yet his talent was electric. Forever a champion.

Farewell Spartacus

Almost Catch-22-like in its brutal exposure of the banal absurdity of war and its related processes, but with a hard, cynical edge that lands like a gut punch. It's a technically brilliant movie and shot beautifully, but I think it has an emotional core that Kubrick doesn't always excel at.

Paths Of Glory

This film is a product of it's time, especially when it comes to the acting, but it still works well today.
Great camera work.
Where this film gets me, is the display of WWI and the incompetence and disregard of life by high command.

8.5/10
#NicksMiniReview
https://t.co/GMDXL5HeCX

**T**_heme_- 9.5/10
**R**_ewatchibility_- 7/10
**A**_cting_- 8.5/10
**K**_inematography_- 9/10
**T**_ime_- 9.5/10
**Total** - 43.5/5 = ==8.7==

An early passion project from writer/director Stanley Kubrick, _Paths of Glory_ was a troubled and unlikely film from the beginning. After he paired critical success with box office disappointment in _The Killing_, MGM was anxious to score a hit with the nascent director. His suggestion, a fictionalized courtroom account of a true WWI incident, wasn’t quite what they had in mind. A moderately successful book some twenty years prior, its first adaptation was such a Broadway flop that every studio in Hollywood turned their noses at the forthcoming screenplay. Kubrick was rebuffed, too, until a behind-the-scenes shakeup and a high-profile benefactor presented him with an opportunity. Bolstered by new bosses at MGM and the support of a big-time star in Kirk Douglas, he managed just enough clout to get the thing made. And the end result? Another critical triumph cut with middling returns.

_Paths of Glory_ isn’t the kind of production that sells a lot of tickets. Its curt honesty doesn’t allow for happy outcomes, and its vocal distrust of the state made far more enemies than friends back in the jingoistic days of 1957. In fact, the film’s progressive views on war, military leadership and political justice earned it a spot on the blacklist in many countries, which can’t have helped its profits. Never mind that its agenda was based in fact - a messy 1915 affair in which the French army executed four random soldiers as an example - as the Cold War ramped up, diplomatic allegiances carried more weight than morality. Germany withheld the film’s release for two years and Spain nixed it for almost thirty. Switzerland banned it out of sheer sympathy for their French allies.

So, did it really merit that much fuss? Maybe. It’s certainly a powerful film, with an effective message that confidently speaks against the establishment. Countless numbers of powerful men, coats lined with medals, meet in lush, comfortable environs to discuss both the fate of their troops and their own overdue promotions. They’re mirrored by rows of aspiring middle-managers in the field; layer upon layer of miserable, self-serving opportunists who specialize in casting blame, not accepting it. Douglas plays the only sensible one in the bunch (or, at least, the only one with a modicum of power), talking down a vindictive general and personally defending the unlucky condemned in kangaroo court before venting a career’s worth of frustrations at the film’s climax. I’m sure there were still many higher-ups in office who recognized themselves in these characters and felt some discomfort. I wouldn’t be surprised if they flexed a little muscle to rid themselves of the embarrassment.

Which is a shame, because it robbed the moviegoing public of an extremely well-crafted, intelligent, engrossing film. We’re fortunate that it didn’t also kneecap the career of one of cinema’s finest creators. Kubrick would revisit the subject of war with _Dr. Strangelove_ in 1964, then again in _Full Metal Jacket_ sixteen years later. This overlooked gem deserves to stand right alongside them.

Perfect depiction of the cruelty of war

God, isn't war just so very funny?

I went in thinking this would be a war movie and got a war movie and a court drama and an analysis of human behavior all in the same movie. Kirk Douglas gives a terrific performance. The war scenes are great and the effects hold up pretty well. The court room stuff is interesting and made me mad. The whole story is messy and there is no clear answer. War is hell.