La Route des Indes

How Lean depicts the cultural, social and climatic differences of India and Britain in the first half is amazing. He gets to the noisy, crowded train stations and markets, the exoticness is astonishing as he downplays the affected stoic British superiority, and he gets drenched in sweat under the burning sun just as he gets drenched during a monsoon downpour. In doing so, he depicts the characters of various social and religious statuses, lets a slowly growing revolt swell in the background and contrasts understanding and sincere interest against “unconscious xenophobia". And that is completely fine as long as those points of friction are shown only incidentally (à la a shot of a train traveling through a breathtaking landscape, which slowly descends under the arches of the viaduct, where dozens of Indians from “inferior castes" with no roof over their heads are crammed together and not highlighted. However, as soon as it turns into a purely intimate declamation without pointing fingers in the middle of the movie, all that's left is “only" an affected theatrical play with excellent performances. (09/05/2020)

I didn't expect that another epic film by David Lean would captivate me, but it is surprising in the way that it only focuses on the epic part in certain sections. Otherwise, it is a beautiful portrayal of how discord between countries can be presented through two individuals who never wanted to be involved in the conflict but circumstances brought them together. David Lean excellently shows how dangerous man can be to man. (26/12/2015)