Customer Reviews

The Return of the Soldier

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This film had limited distribution when released and the HBO
video was not around long. The dvd is most welcome. Alan Bates
portrays a shell shocked soldier during World War I. His family
fears that if he gets his memory back his life will never be the
same. Glenda Jackson portrays Margaret, his first love, and the
only person Bates remembers. She gives one of her finest
performances. In an ugly raincoat and an even uglier hat she still
manages to be more attractive than the beautifully coifed and
dressed Julie Christie who stars as Bates wife who wants him to
get his memory back.. Ann-Margret also turns in another fine
performance. Many thanks to Trinity for putting this out on
DVD.

When I read that this DVD was "full screen" I opted to rent it rather than buy it. If you care about the film as I always have, you'll be pleased to know that the "Tinity Home Entertainment" transfer is excellent and in WIDESCREEN.

With several first rate actors and excellent filming, I was dismayed by the weak story and dialog, just not at all what I expected. Julie Christie's character is too haughty and conceited (snarl, snarl, snarl, who would want to be around her for a minute, let alone be married to her?), and Glenda Jackson is quaintly dowdy but amazingly we are told this ordinary lower middle-class woman has a romantic history with our rich, shell-shocked hero. In a nutshell, the story wasn't believable, and the script seemed to lack subtlety. The sets, costumes, filming, and cast should have resulted in something fantastic, like a Merchant/Ivory film, but it didn't come off well, and the stilted dialog and uncomfortable acting were the kiss-off. It's strange how so many terrific components would not add up.

What a treat to discover this relatively unknown film starring the great Alan Bates, Glenda Jackson, Julie Christie, and a remarkable Ann Margaret, in one of her more subtle roles. The period "between-the-wars" is ripe for great story-telling, especially when adopted from novels. The adjustment of the "Return of the Soldier" is carried off well by Alan Bates. There is the unspoken feeling that things will end as they do in the film. The bittersweet sadness of regret and acceptance finally advance in such a way that it is felt more than stated. This is the quality that makes a film good in my opinion. The score by Sir Richard Rodney Bennett is excellent, and adds to the overall emotional feel of the film. Unfortunately, a full OST soundtrack CD was never made. The good news is that there is a compilation CD that has 8 tracks from the film. That CD is "Love from a Stranger: Four British Film Scores". It is reported that this little film did not do well at the box office in 1982, (due to a "let-down" ending) and hence fell into obscurity, but don't let that sway you. If you like English period pieces, this one is good enough for 'Masterpiece Theatre'.

Directed by Alan Bridges, this exquisite yet disturbing 1982 film which was not released in the USA until February, 1985, is a reasonably faithful adaptation (the screenplay is by Hugh Whitemore) of Dame Rebecca West's 1918 novel of the same name. This, West's first novel, has been adapted for the stage, too, by John van Druten, ten years after its first publication. West is known for a variety of other prose works (including critical studies of Henry James and D.H. Lawrence) and, of course, for her liaison and subsequent ten year long (1913-23) partnership with H.G. Wells, following the latter's partial disclosure of his libertine sexual views in his work `Marriage', 1912.

As far as the cast of the film is concerned, the hugely successful triumvirate of Alan Bates, Julie Christie and composer, Richard Rodney Bennett (yes, all key factors in John Schlesinger's 1967 remarkable adaptation of Thomas Hardy's `Far from the Madding Crowd') return here; fans of Bennett will be enthralled by the brooding, spell-binding soundtrack ferrying many of this composer's atmospheric hallmarks. This score conspires perfectly with the subtle, understated cinematography and with the poignant silences, which result from Bridges' admirably discrete direction of the film.

Each member of the cast is somewhere between competent and excellent; they all handle the delicate nature of their characterisation - and of the plot - rather well. It is in no way an action film; it explores the daunting filial, social and emotional implications of mentally paralysing brain damage inflicted by the most bloody and unjustifiable of conflicts; World War I. Emotional, class, and ethical issues become interwoven in an `inextricable whirl' of tensions, conflicts and values. The film will `speak' in different ways to different individuals, dependent, this reviewer suspects, upon each viewer's personal disposition and `conditioning'.

Alan Bates plays the aristocratic army officer, Chris, who has his memory `frozen' at a certain stage of his past through suffering a form of shellshock in the trenches, meaning that he no longer is able to either recall or even recognise his wife, Kitty, Julie Christie, but does vividly remember a previous fiancée, Glenda Jackson, now a married teacher living humbly yet, apparently, also contentedly. The cast includes Ann-Margret, Frank Finlay and Jeremy Kemp.

Probably not a film to be watched whilst enduring a `night of the soul' experience, or the like, but a film which I can specifically recommend as a sensitive adaptation of a hugely challenging novel, well ahead of its time in 1918 and one which now, perhaps just as much as then, begs us to assess the real, tangible, and life-throttling cost of a `war with no reason'.

Michael Calum Jacques (aka Mike MacKinnon, former radio presenter)

This film explores the frailties of the emotions when war disturbs what is seemingly a pleasant and acceptable way of life. This soldier's return upsets the lives of all his family and an old love from the past. The ethical questions posed leave the viewer in the same dilemma as the participants.

A very touching story, it tells of what can happen to a soldier because of war.
Very well done.

Great plot dealing with a WWI British officer who is shellshocked and suffers amnesia concerning his past 15 years. He is cured but the cure is perhaps worse than the affliction.

Great acting, music and photograhy. No special features. 1983 release.

JBF