The Way Back (2010)

Siberian gulag escapees travel four thousand miles by foot to freedom in India.

Director:

Peter Weir

Writers:

Slavomir Rawicz (novel), Peter Weir (screenplay)

Stars:

Jim Sturgess, Ed Harris, Colin Farrell

Nominated for 1 Oscar. Another 4 wins & 4 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Dragos Bucur	...	Zoran
Colin Farrell	...	Valka
Ed Harris	...	Mr. Smith
Alexandru Potocean	...	Tomasz
Saoirse Ronan	...	Irena
Mark Strong	...	Khabarov
Gustaf Skarsgård	...	Voss
Jim Sturgess	...	Janusz
Sebastian Urzendowsky	...	Kazik
Zachary Baharov	...	Interrogator (as Zahari Baharov)
Sally Brunski	...	Janusz's Wife, 1939 (as Sally Edwards)
Igor Gnezdilov	...	Bohdan
Dejan Angelov	...	Andrei
Stanislav Pishtalov	...	Commandant
Mariy Rosen	...	Lazar (as Marii Grigorov)

Storyline

In 1941, three men attempt to flee communist Russia, escaping a Siberian gulag. This movie tells their story and that of four others who escaped with them and a teenage girl, Irena Zielinska (Saoirse Ronan), who joins them in flight. The group's natural leader is Janusz Weiszczek (Jim Sturgess), a Pole condemned by accusations secured by torturing his wife, spent much of his youth outdoors, and knows how to live in the wild. They escape under cover of a snowstorm: cynical American Mr. Smith (Ed Harris), Russian thug Valka (Colin Farrell), comedic accountant Zoran (Dragos Bucur), pastry chef Tomasz Horodinsky (Alexandru Potocean), who draws, Priest Andrejs Voss (Gustav Skarsgård), and Polish Kazik (Sebastian Urzendowsky), who suffers from night blindness. They face freezing nights, lack of food and water, mosquitoes, an endless desert, the Himalayas, as well as many moral and ethical dilemmas throughout the journey towards freedom.

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Plot Keywords:

long walk | oasis | gulag | desert | priest | 

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Taglines:

Their escape was just the beginning

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Genres:

Adventure | Drama | History

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated PG-13 for violent content, depiction of physical hardships, a nude image and brief strong language

Did You Know?

Trivia

Renowned historian Anne Applebaum, who won the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for Non-Fiction for "GULAG: A history"(2003), worked as a historical consultant on this movie. She said about the historical accuracy: "I read the script a couple of times. I know that other people read the script as well. He (Writer, Producer, and Director Peter Weir) sent it to another historian at Stanford and he sent it to a couple of the survivors whose names I'd given him. And I have to say I thought the result was superb. You know, there may be little licenses you have to take in order to convey to an audience that doesn't know the story, what's going on. Sometimes the guards say things they might not have said because they are explaining things to the audience. But given that he needed to do things like that, I think it's extraordinary. It's amazingly real. You understand exactly how claustrophobic it was. Many of the incidents that you see in the movie come from real stories or come from gulag survivor and Writer Varlam Shalamov or come from other gulag writers. I can see them almost exactly. I think it's an extremely well-done film and about as true-to-life as you could make a movie." (2010)

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Goofs

Janusz demonstrates a method using shadows of a stick and rock to find the compass direction of south. Yet, many of the scenes show them walking in a direction inconsistent with sun angles i.e. sun at their backs, which would have them walking north.

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Quotes

[first lines]
[in Polish, using English subtitles]
Interrogator: [presents pen to sign confession]
Janusz: No.
Interrogator: Bring in the witness.
Janusz's Wife, 1939: [brought in]
Interrogator: Do you know this man? His name?
Janusz's Wife, 1939: Janusz Wieszczek.
Interrogator: Witness, what's your relationship with this man?
Janusz's Wife, 1939: [crying] I am his wife.
[...]

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Connections

Featured in History Buffs: The Death of Stalin (2018)

User Reviews

love this movie highly recommend.

I think it's always difficult to portray hardship and endurance in films purely because you only experience it for a couple of hours or so. This had me understanding the terrible conditions for real....i think. The search for water in the Gobi desert had me thinking twice about attempting the same thing as a holiday. Make up was fantastic and the bleakness of the scenery was soo beautiful

Details

Country:

USA United Arab Emirates Poland India

Language:

English Russian Polish Tibetan Mongolian

Release Date:

21 January 2011 (USA)

Also Known As:

The Way Back

Filming Locations:

Morocco

Box Office

Budget:

$30,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend USA:

$1,218,868, 23 January 2011

Gross USA:

$2,701,859

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$24,172,201

Company Credits

Production Co:

Exclusive Films, National Geographic Films, Imagenation Abu Dhabi FZ

Technical Specs

Runtime:

133 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Color:

Color Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1