Paths of Glory

The Film

How should we categorise Paths of Glory? A war film? Not really. The plot takes the viewer away from the action of war and turns on a court case. A courtroom drama, then? Again, no. The trial is a foregone conclusion and dealt with in a single scene. An anti-war film? This is the commonest assumption, especially when seen in the context of director Stanley Kubrick’s later work on such movies as Doctor Strangelove and Full Metal Jacket. But this is a very different film from either of those. Its target is not war. The protagonist, Colonel Dax (Kirk Douglas) is a good soldier and has no problem leading his men into action. The villains are the old men conducting the war, almost for their own amusement. Their elegant, pampered lives are on trial here and the coldness with which their men are sacrificed to vanity and stupidity. The film is not anti-war so much as it is against this abuse of power. War is the backdrop that dramatises the abuse.

Based on a 1935 novel by Humphrey Cobb, Paths of Glory is based on a real historical event in the First World War in which four French soldiers were chosen to be executed as a punishment when their exhausted platoon refused an order to attack. In the film it becomes three soldiers under the command of Colonel Dax. Here, a futile and impossible attack is ordered on a German position (referred to as the ‘Anthill’ to leave us in no doubt about its lack of strategic value). The attack has been cooked up by the French chief of staff, General Broullard (Adolphe Menjou) he pressurises an initially reluctant officer General Mireau (George Macready, magnificently slimy) to use his troops for an attack he knows to be impossible, on the promise of his own advancement. After the attack fails three soldiers are chosen to be executed as an example. Dax (who turns out, rather conveniently, to have been the most brilliant criminal lawyer in France before the war) demands the right to defend them in the hastily convened court martial. The attack, the trial and its aftermath form the heart of this story, each brilliantly staged and shot by Kubrick in only his third feature film.

Kubrick fills the film with technical flourishes, such as the extraordinary tracking shots taking us through the trenches. Long takes are punctuated with abrupt edits. Wide angle lenses are used, emphasising the smallness of the human beings in relation to their environment. The cinematography is consistently excellent, with Kubrick proving the importance of his background as a stills photographer, especially in the way he lights and frames his actors and the extraordinary sets.

Performances are more uneven. Kubrick is more interested here in the technical aspects of film making than he is in getting performances from his actors. Adolphe Menjou is too mannered at times and his scenes with George Macready are stiffly staged. Kirk Douglas is fine, but is busy making a Kirk Douglas movie, with its requisite intensity, raging against authority and (a requirement of his contract we are told) at least one scene with no shirt. The supporting actors are also a mixed bag. There are good performances from Ralph Meeker and Joe Terkel as two of the condemned men. But the third, Timothy Carey, has fallen too heavily under the spell of the Method. His improvisations sit oddly in relation to his fellow actors and his final breakdown is self-indulgent. The extras have a number of good stories to tell about Carey, who was finally fired from the movie, leaving a stand in to be used for his final shots.

Kubrick tells his story in a cool, distanced way. The generals are engaged in a game of chess – look at the chessboard patterns on the floors of the chateaux in which they have installed themselves and from which they plot their slaughters. Kubrick, the chess master, films with the same detachment. The soldiers, of course, are the pawns. Kubrick emphasises this in his superb depiction of the attack that is at the centre of the film. Led by Douglas, the men attempt in vain to cross No Man’s Land to take their objective. The camera watches from a distance, tracking their movements in a single, wide shot. Ants attempting to take the Anthill.

Kubrick would do his best work when freed from the shackles of studio expectation and interfering stars. But here, as with his next collaboration with Douglas on Spartacus, there is a splendid tension between the budding genius and the studio system. It is Kubrick’s most openly emotional film and ends in a superb scene unlike any other he ever shot. A German girl is forced to sing for the French soldiers. Initially they are raucous, but as they listen to her fragile, beguiling voice, they become silent, then begin to cry. In this detached story it is a moment of unashamed sentimentality. And it retains its power today.

It is a moment of contemplation before the soldiers return to action. Their orders to move out arrive as they listen to the song. But there may have been another reason for the scene’s sentiment, apart from its narrative function. The girl playing the singer is credited as Susanne Christian. She is better known today as Christiane Kubrick. Making this film had allowed Kubrick to meet and marry the woman with whom he would be for the rest of his life.

Technical Specs

The film is presented in an aspect ratio of 1.66:1, making this the latest Kubrick film to be returned to its proper ratio on home video. The previous MGM DVD was an open matte 1.33:1. Criterion have demonstrated repeatedly their ability to handle restorations of this kind, so it comes as no surprise that the visual presentation of Paths of Glory is very fine indeed. The age of the film and the quality of the elements are bound to be an issue, but blacks are deep and contrast is fine. There is the expected improvement in clarity, but thankfully no attempt to erase film grain. The best test of the restoration is in the night scenes set in No Man’s Land. These are strikingly beautiful in their lighting, using very high contrast levels. The stark lighting and deep shadows are very well handled. The previous release offered murky gloom, where the blu-ray offers beautiful, high contrast imagery.

Following their usual practice, Criterion retains the monaural soundtrack, presented here in an uncompressed Linear PCM track. The digital restoration offers results that are as good as possible from a film of this age. Sound plays a crucial role in Paths of Glory, as it always does in Kubrick’s films. The gunfire will not trouble your subwoofer, but this is not that kind of film. The sound field is more concerned with the echo of a voice in grandiose room, the click of a military heel on a marble floor, a distant waltz playing behind a closed door. These subtler audio delights accumulate to precise effect and are superbly captured in the restoration.

Special Features

Previous releases of Paths of Glory offered nothing but a trailer. Criterion have decided to change all that with the following supplements:

- A commentary, provided by critic Gary Giddins. He is very well prepared and demonstrates a great knowledge of the film and its source novel. At times the level of information can get a little dry, as we are treated to the year and place of birth of actors in small roles. But there is much to enjoy here and Naremore’s research will delight Kubrick obsessives.
- A brief, tantalising audio interview with Kubrick, conducted by author Jeremy Bernstein.
- A 1979 edition of the BBC chat show Parkinson in which Kirk Douglas talks about his career with Paths of Glory getting a significant mention. If you stick it out to the end you will get to hear Douglas singing ‘Maybe its because I’m a Londoner’. I am not sure whether this can really be counted as bonus material…
- Newly recorded interviews with producer James B. Harris, actress Christiane Kubrick and long-time executive producer and collaborator Jan Harlan. The first of these is the best, as Harris recalls his partnership with the young Kubrick and some of the tensions on set.
- A brief excerpt from a French TV new programme about the ‘Maupas affair’, the real events that in part inspired the novel.
- A theatrical trailer.
- A booklet containing an excellent short essay by Kubrick expert James Naremore.

Final thoughts

Kubrick’s later work may have eclipsed it with technical brilliance and mastery of the medium of cinema. But Paths of Glory is a modest masterpiece in its own right, with many flashes of the genius that was to come. But don’t take my word for it. When Steven Spielberg heard the news of the death of his friend and colleague Stanley Kubrick he decided to run a Kubrick movie to remember his friend. He chose Paths of Glory.