David Lean, however, does fairly much what some would say could not be done, by depicting both the "heroes" and the "enemies" with some semblance of complexity, in The Bridge on The River Kwai. While the primary focus is on British and American soldiers, the main Japanese character, a brutal commander, is depicted as tragic rather than evil, and the message is not that the heroes are right and the enemies are wrong, but that all the players play a game where everyone, in one way or another, loses. I felt, with my first viewing, that the movie had actually gotten away with something that I wouldn't have expected a 1957 big budget film to get away with, and, on my second viewing, now feel that the film is even more complex and deliberately unresolved on a number of issues, most involving the characters played by Alec Guinness and Sussee Hakawaya.
As the story begins, a large group of British soldiers, led by Col. Nicholson (Guinness) are taken prisoner somewhere in the Indonesian area by the Japanese, led by Commander Siato (Hakawaya), who, as long-time captive Shears (William Holden) explains it, has a brutal reputation. Put it this way: Shears is one of the maybe two or three who are still alive after the last batch of prisoners came this way.
The Japanese need these prisoners to help build a bridge across the river, which will be used to better transport supplies and prisoners. It ought to be an easy job for Siato to push around these people now under his thumb, but he doesn't count on the aggressive stance taken by Nicholson. Nicholson brings up the Geneva Convention, in which one of the rules state that officers who are taken prisoner shall not perform manual labour. Of course, Siato will not stand for such excuses, and time and time again attempts to punish Nicholson for this defiance. Nicholson, however, will not budge, for by giving in to the Japanese, he will have failed in his duty to protect the laws, customs, and traditions that British society hinges upon.
