RateItAll: The Opinion Network

Five stars if seen on the big screen. Not a great movie on DVD, too cramped. One of the big block-buster movies of the 60's. Had everyone whistling the "Colonel Bogey March" before the year was out. I agree that Wm. Holden's part was tacked on like Steve McQueen in the Great Escape to appeal more to an American audience.

This is another David Lean extravaganza. I don't like prison movies but I always was a William Holden fan so I shall make an exception. The movie has an unpleasant content. Looking backwards, it doesn't nearly show the brutality of the Japanese.

This movie was great in the sense that it explored a war hero as he had never been explored before. Surely the commander was a good man and a great solider, but his lust for greatness and legend came over his want to fight for the cause. This was eventually his demise. I do agree with PBeavr, this isn't exactly a war movie, it's really more of a character exploration and story telling movie, and a great one at that.

A good solid, dependable movie. Not truly great, but well above average. Guinness is magnificent, as is the Japanese commander of the prison camp.

One of the all time greats, a classic movie, don't make em like that anymore!!!

It's a classic until the most compelling aspect of the film - the psychological war of wits/wills between the Alec Guinness and Sessue Hayakawa characters - is sidetracked by a long, tedious William Holden jungle side-adventure. Overrated. Not even the best war movie of 1957 - Paths of Glory was that.

Good movie, they just couldn't spell the main actor Alec Guinness's last name correctly in the credits. (I hope I did here!)

Not only an incredible movie-but arguably the best movie made from a novel by Pierre Boulle.

A character study of men in wartime and I would say David Lean's best film. A three hour movie but Lean is able to hold the audience's attention by developing the characters in the first hour. The story is about Allied soldiers in World War II held prisoner in a Japanese camp and forced to build a bridge. William Holden plays an American soldier who escapes and is rescued by British soldiers who ask him to go back in there plan to blow up the bridge. Holden's actubg is wonderful. However the most powerful performance and one of the best ever shown on the screen is that of Alec Guiness as Colonel Nicholson who due to his honor and convictions refuses to kowtow to the head of the Japanese prison camp demands. The head of the camp Col Saito was played brilliantly by Sessue Hayakawa. The last scene in the movie is a classic and will have you on the edge of your seats. This movie is not to be missed.

One of the greatest dramas ever filmed.Asuperb cast,fantastic story and great score.Alec Guiness as the crazed British Colonel intent on showing British superiority over his captors by building a bridge that will harm the British war effort carries this movie.Playing an American who escaped from the camp,William Holden, turns in a stirling performance as the man who must destroy the bridge.A true masterpiece.

One of my 3 favorite films. Not so much a war story as a character study surrounded by a war. In the end, you really forget about WWII because you are so interested in what will happen between the characters. Beautifully written, shot, and directed. And the acting, oh, the acting. Alec Guinness gives one of the great performances in cinema. Everyone else is pitch perfect. Underlying symbolism and commentary on war are what makes this film stand out from the rest. Also, one of the best written and exciting last scenes in the movies.

A movie about honor, and the pride to two military leaders going head to head on a psychological battlefield instead of military combat. I'm not sure why people refer to it as such a great war movie, because their isn't any actual war like fighting in it. It takes place in a POW camp, and is a study of character in extreme situations. If you are looking for a what I think of more as a war movie, such as Saving Private Ryan, or Platoon this probably isn't what you are after. If you are interested in studying the character of a man and an emotionally provoking ending, by all means get this movie. Simply terrific! Oh by the way it was nominated for about 9 Academy awards, and won for best picture and actor.

Best war film ever made with a great psychological war between the Alex Guiness character and the Sessue Hayakawa character.

One of the Greatest war movies of all time, and another masterpiece for the greatest director that ever lived. A masterfully directed WW2 movie especially the ending.

The length of this movie makes for boring passages at times, but altogether this is a great David Lean movie. It portrays all the spirit of resistence, determination, and exhileration, and in the end, futility. I hated the ending.

Another David Lean masterpiece.