Perhaps the truly greatest war film of all time

Rating: 10/10 (27 March 2008)

I wish we could give a film more than a 10 out of 10 rating. Because PATHS OF GLORY is one of the very few films that I'd give an 11! It is perfection. Plain and simple. It is a bare bones film, very short, and cuts to the chase. There are several fairly long scenes, yet none of them seem long and there are no wasted words, thoughts, or moments in any of the scenes. They are all perfect. Perfection is maybe an overused word, but not in this film. Directed by the great Stanley Kubrick and coming out in a great year of films 1957, this could very well be Kubrick's true greatest accomplishment.
Paths of Glory takes place during WWI, but is it a war film? Debatable. It's about a regiment of French soldiers on the front lines forced into an impossible, unwinnable situation to take the 'Ant Hill' by their power-mad regimental commander General Mireau (played to 100% cold, selfish, heartless perfection by George Macready). The attack is unsuccessful (as expected) and Mireau literally wants blood for the failure (he even orders fire upon his own men for cowering back to the trenches during the unwinnable battle). The battle itself, while extremely short for a large scale assault, is technically executed to perfection with long-view wide, tracking shots of all the action so you can see everything at once. And in the middle of all of this action is brigade commander Colonel Dax (played by Kirk Douglas in truly the most impressive performance of his legendary career). Colonel Dax orders his men to return back to battle, but to no avail. He finally sees it as unwinnable as his men.
In the aftermath, Mireau wants multiple executions to take place, but 'compromises' so that one man from each company in the front line battalion will be court-martialed for cowardice. 3 soldiers Paris, Ferol, and Arnaud (played by Ralph Meeker, Tim Carey, and Joe Turkel) are chosen for various reasons (one by lot, one b/c his unpopularity, and one b/c he knew of his company commander's part in a soldier's death). Col. Dax, a lawyer in the civilian world, represents the men. The trial is pure, military hogwash. Dax isn't allowed to present crucial information that could exonerate the men and the tribunal looks like they have already decided the men are guilty before the trial even starts. Dax has one final chance to save the men as he is given critical information by the gunnery commander that Mireau ordered him to fire upon his own men. Dax takes it to Mireau's superior General Broulard (Adolphe Menjou) in hopes of getting a stay of execution for the men, but to no avail.
The film has a lot of great, memorable characters and moments that stay in the minds of the viewer long after the film is over: (1) the cockroach scene, (2) two men discussing how they would prefer to be killed (slowly or quickly, with a knife or with a gun), (3) the company commander (in charge of the execution) who wrongly chose Pvt.Paris to be tried apologizing to him before the fateful execution and Paris nodding his head in forgiveness, (4) Dax telling off Broulard calling him a degenerate and that he can go to hell. (5) And finally, there's the great ending, perhaps the most memorable moment of the film where a captured German girl (Stanley Kubrick's real life wife) who sang that melancholy tune that the French soldiers hummed to in sadness as she sang it, perhaps thinking about their wrongly executed comrades in arms.
Paths of Glory says a lot about not only the military, but also society itself. There are haves and have nots, those who rule and those who are ruled, the privileged and the lower class. It's a war film in the sense that it accurately depicts the grittiness and grunge of it. It's an anti-war film in the way it portrays the lunacy of parts of it, like the unwinnable attack on the Ant Hill that would have had no meaningful outcome on the war itself. It's a social film in the way it clearly delineates the high-ranking military (the establishment) and the rank-and-file soldiers (the working class). It's an anti-establishment film in that it portrays the high-ranking officers as power-hungry, self-absorbed fat cats who only want recognition. Who's the real enemy? Those we fight against or those who we thought are supposed to be on our side protecting us, but literally sending us to our slaughter to gain promotions? But most importantly, it's a human film b/c it accurately depicts all different types of human beings, each one delineated clearly so that the viewer can either relate to b/c we know that's how we would act or react or either abhor and despise b/c we'd like to believe that we, or no human being, could possibly act that way.