The way back is inspired by the true story of a group of prisoners in a Siberian jail, who first escape their prison of guns and barbed wire, and then escape from their true prison; the harsh and unforgiving wasteland that surrounds them.

The group of escapees that The Way Back centers around, do the impossible four times in a row. First they escape from a Russian prison camp, then they cross the Siberian wasteland, then The Gobi desert, then the Himalayas. All of this is done on foot, and with next to no food or water.

Despite the party of escapees including around seven or eight members, only four really emerge as full characters. The groups’s de-facto leader Janusz (Jim Sturgess), Mr. Smith (Ed Harris) an American who was arrested in Russia, Valka (Colin Farrell) a hardened criminal from Moscow, and later a suspicious girl named Irena (Saoirse Ronan), who the group reluctantly allow to accompany them. There are other characters of course, but they sit somewhere between extras, and deeply interesting individuals, and it’s tough to think of them as either.

One aspect of the film that I really enjoyed was the lack of contrived drama. There is very little conflict between the men, and none of them lust after the girl, she just becomes another part of the diverse family that forms.
The Way Back is not a drama, it’s an experiential movie, and the entertainment is to be had in being a companion upon their journey, not an observer. Believe me when I say: You will feel ever step they take, you will leave the theater tired. 

Which is not to say that drama is not to be had when watching The Way Back, quite the contrary. The Way Back is one the bleakest and saddest movies I’ve seen in quite some time. There were times when I had to fight back some very real tears, something I’m largely immune to in a movie.

The events depicted in The Way Back would have been difficult to cram into the space of a movie, but director Peter Weir does a good job of compressing a journey that could easily be expanded into four movies, into two and a half hours, without it feeling awkward.

With that said, the compression that the story undergoes is obvious. I got the feeling that most of the movie had been brutally edited out to save time. This doesn’t impact on the quality of the movie itself, however. It doesn’t feel rushed, and it still retains the sense of passing time usually possessed by a longer movie.

The Way Back is a film that takes no short-cuts, and makes no compromises. It’s depiction of the group’s quest for survival may seem episodic at times, but  it always remains mesmerizingly involving.

-Reviewed by Jack Kelleher