THE RAILWAY MAN
Directed by
JONATHAN TEPLITZKTY
Produced by
ANDY PATERSON CHRIS BROWN BILL CURBISHLEY
Screenplay by
FRANK COTTRELL BOYCE ANDY PATERSON
Based on the memoir by Eric Lomax
Starring
COLIN FIRTH NICOLE KIDMAN JEREMY IRVINE STELLAN SKARSGARD HIROYUKI SANADA SAM REID TANROH ISHIDA
Having had a quick chat with the director Johathan Teplitzkty just before I was to see his latest film, “The Railway Man”, I was quite geared up to see this QLD
/UK production. The Railway Man is the story of Eric Lomax played by Colin Firth and Jeramy Irvine as the young Lomax. It’s the story of one of the survivors of the notorious Thai/Burma “Death Railway” who kept quiet about what happened to them in the War. The film opens with meeting of Eric and Patty Lomax, who meet on a train. It’s love at first sight. Two elope, but the scars of Lomax’s time in the war rear their ugly head again. It’s something he refuses to talk to about. Desperate to understand this other side of her husband, Patti goes to Finlay (Stellan Skarsgaard), another survivor from the camp who is well aware of the torture he suffered long ago. Finlay reveals that Lomax was tortured at the hands of a Japanese Soldier. It is also revealed that this soldier is still alive. What happens next is a powerful course of events set in motion by one man trying to step out of the shadow of his suffering.
Major sequences were filmed on the actual death railway, reclaimed from the jungle seventy years after the events that claimed tens of thousands of live. The film was shot in Thailand, Scotland, Queensland, in parts of Ipswich and the Gold Coast. Teplitzkty, has directed a similar film to his 2011 feature The Burning Man. A portrait about a man, not on the verge, but in the full bodied midst of a nervous breakdown. Teplizkty is one of our finest Australian directors, he knows how to make a beautiful film, he knows how to draw out fine performances from his actor and he sure as hell knows how to pack an emotional punch.
