King Rat

Description

Product Description Oscar(r)- nominee George Segal (1967, Best Supporting Actor, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf) became astar with his performance in this epic WWII drama based on the best-selling novel by Shogun author James Clavell. The movie chronicles the scams of a streetwise GI held in a Japanese prison camp. Under the harrowing camp conditions, he rises to a position of power over his military and social superiors, manipulating those around him and controlling the prison's black market. KING RAT is a powerful exploration of one man's struggle to survive and flourish against all odds. It was nominated for two 1965 Academy Awards(r) (Best Art Direction, Best Cinematography). .com High on the list of best POW movies, King Rat bears some comparison to that compound over by the River Kwai... but this is an entirely more cynical exercise. In a Japanese prison camp, a brash American corporal (George Segal) runs a variety of money-making operations, much to the amazement of a young British officer (James Fox). Director Bryan Forbes, who adapted James Clavell's novel, follows different POWs through various strands of plot, each episode seemingly designed to highlight the dog-eat-dog nature of men held in close confinement. (In one pointedly black-comic sequence, it becomes man-eat-dog.) This was one of Segal's breakthrough roles, and his modern style fits the movie's anti-heroic, '60s approach. It was Oscar®-nominated for art direction and cinematography, which may sound odd for such a bleakly confined location, but the lucid starkness of the camp justifies the nods. The John Barry score, while apt, is similarly stark. --Robert Horton