IN THE DARK/Jonathan Richards
THE FOUR FEATHERS
Directed by Shekhar Kapur
Rated PG-13, 127 minutes
A.E.W. Mason's 1902 novel The Four Feathers has a romantic derring-do that has made it catnip for the movie camera pretty much since the contraption was invented. It's been filmed at least a half-dozen times, first in 1915, and most memorably in Zoltan Korda's 1939 classic starring Ralph Richardson.
The end of the Thirties was a time of build-up for war, and this story of cowardice and courage in the midday of the British Empire played right into the swelling spirit of patriotism. We now find ourselves staring down that road again, and this remake by Indian director Shekhar Kapur ("Elizabeth") can't help but be viewed through the prism of current events. And when the hero goes native in the Sudan and passes for an Arab, he's a dead ringer for John Walker Lindh.
Harry Feversham (Heath Ledger) is the son and grandson of distinguished British officers, and has never seriously questioned his path in life. He's a popular figure in the halls and on the playing fields of his military academy, he's surrounded by pals, including his best friend Jack (Wes Bentley of "American Beauty"), and he's engaged to be married to the beautiful Ethne (Kate Hudson), whom Jack also loves. But then word arrives that General Gordon and his troops have been slaughtered at Khartoum. Harry's company is ordered to ship out, and Harry must confront the fear of combat that lurks beneath his scarlet uniform tunic. He resigns his commission, and quickly finds himself rejected by his fiancée, disowned by his father, and ostracized from polite society. The coup de grace comes when he receives a package containing four white feathers, the traditional symbol of cowardice. Three are from his former comrades-in-arms. The fourth is from Ethne.
With his life in ruins, Harry does the only thing a disgraced young hero can do: he heads over to the desert to fight the enemy on his own, prove his manhood, save his friends, and restore his good name. There's no real plan of action for this, nor could there be. He soon finds himself beaten, unconscious, and sizzling alone in the middle of the desert, the plat du jour on the vulture menu. But he is rescued by Abou (Djimon Hounsou), a mysterious, princely black Arab, who takes him on as a personal reclamation project, God knows why (literally - the only explanation Abou offers is "God put you in my way.") Harry himself never inquires too closely into the mystery; there is an unspoken assumption that any third world character would leap at the chance to be the sidekick of an Englishman.
"The Four Feathers" doesn't really carry the banner for colonialism and imperialism. British officers in battle are shown for the most part as thoughtless, brutal, arrogant, and even stupid. Kapur casts a wary 21st century eye on the vainglory of military adventuring and empire building in faraway lands, and his tone is sometimes dusted with irony. But this story is at heart a boy's adventure fantasy, and when Dr, Johnson's remark that "Every man feels meanly about himself for not having been a soldier" is quoted, the tongue never strays anywhere near the cheek.
It is perhaps this earnestness that gives the whole thing the unintended feel of a Monty Python extravaganza, or one of Michael Palin's "Ripping Yarns" You can almost identify individual members of the Python gang among the cast of characters. And in one scene, a magnificently shot desert battle between the outnumbered and out-maneuvered British troops and the warriors of the Mahdi, there is a line that must have been written by John Cleese. The redcoats have formed a square, a classic formation to ward off an attack from any direction. The battle rages. Suddenly a cry rings out: "We're being attacked from behind!"
The cast plays with a straightforwardness that suits the movie's earnest tone. There seems to have been a shortage of available English actors (they're all playing Americans in Hollywood movies), so the leads here are an Australian (Ledger) and two Americans (Hudson and Bentley), who engage 19th century Englishness with varying degrees of success (Hudson even has to mouth the syntactic porridge of the line "You and her and Jack and I.") Most impressive is Hounsou, who combines a regal bearing and a killer torso to good effect. There's a rousing sweep to some of this, especially in the battle scenes, and the cinematography by Robert Richardson is often spectacular. But the movie has a choppy, unconnected feel, and there is the suspicion that an epic that came in at just over two hours must have felt the heavy breathing of a studio executive in the cutting room.
In the end, it turns out that war is not about the noble sentiments enunciated by statesmen and politicians to justify their actions. It's about the comradeships forged among men in the furnace of combat. Maybe it would be better to let them stay home and play football.
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