Paths of Glory Brutally Emphasizes the Anguish of Everyday Citizens In Times of War

War is a concept that Stanley Kubrick is fascinated and repulsed by. Through Kubrick's movies, one can tell he believes that war is an expansive effort that ends up benefiting nobody and usually destroying everything. Two of his most famous works as a filmmaker, Dr. Strangelove and Full Metal Jacket, differ heavily in tone but share a common thread of exploring this perspective by going to the ground-level of combat and examining how it impacts people on a profound level. His fascination with this topic is apparent in even one of his earliest works as a filmmaker, Paths of Glory. This 1957 feature was Kubrick's fourth directorial effort and it kicked off Kubrick's examination and condemnation of the concept of war with utterly fascinating results.


This time, Kubrick sets his wartime contemplations during World War I, with a French general, General Mireau (George Macready), being ordered to take down a German base known as "The Anthill". It's an impossible task but his superiors, namely General Georges (Adolphe Menjou) want it done, so Mireau orders his men to get it done. Heading into the heart of No Man's Land, the men tasked with this mission, which include Colonel Dax (Kirk Douglas), already see its staggering impossibility, it's a suicide mission. Once the dust clears, the failure of the mission ends up falling on the shoulders of not people like Mireau, but three randomly selected soldiers, who will be killed via firing squad much to the chagrin of Colonel Dax.

Much like 21st-century-productions The Death of Stalin or Chernobyl, Paths of Glory is a European-set tale that makes no attempt to have a number of its characters, including protagonist Colonel Dax, speak in accents native to the country it takes place in. Like with the two aforementioned modern-day creative endeavors, such a bold choice ends up working just fine for Paths of Glory. I'm not sure British, German or French accents being actually present in the story would have been inherently a detriment to the proceedings but it seems clear Kubrick's focus was more on tone and conveying the gruesome backdoor politics of war than trying to get Kirk Douglas to do a pitch-perfect French accent. Considering how well Paths of Glory does on its own terms, eschewing foreign accents seems like a smart move.

Though Kubrick's reliably incredible filmmaking makes the horrors experienced by the soldiers in the trenches appropriately harrowing, the screenplay (penned by Kubrick, Calder Willingham and Jim Thompson) intentionally creates the most disturbing story material out of watching the three innocent soldiers struggling to comprehend their gruesome fate. Paths of Glory totally commits to this darker storytelling avenue in its intentionally messy depiction of the behavior of the trio of men prior to their execution. None of the three characters emerge as a hero in the middle of all this turmoil, they instead resort to violence against one another, uncontrollable fits of sobbing and intense pleading for aid from anybody will listen.

Both the script and Kubrick's camera linger heavily on the anguish of these characters who experience as much hardship at the hands of the country they're fighting for as they did from enemy forces on the battlefield. This hauntingly intimate portion of the plot comes to an appropriately bleak conclusion with a brutally-crafted execution sequence whose every carefully-chosen shot is delicately crafted to heighten the tension of this event. With each passing shot, we realize more and more, just like the prisoners, that there isn't a last-minute savior coming to save this trio of innocent men. The reality of this brutality hits one harder and harder with each second before culminating in a moment filmed with a rawness that ensures the gruesomeness of this execution is captured accurately.

Beyond just the masterfully-crafted prisoner sequences, Kirk Douglas plays a lead character who comes to realize just how deeply corrupt the forces orchestrating this war are. Even his eventual revenge against the dastardly General Mireau leads not to tidy resolution but to him becoming even more disillusioned with the system he's fighting for. Paths of Glory is a bleak examination of the grisly ways war impacts average people the hardest, it's a work of cinema that feels like Stanley Kubrick is using the art of film to strike a blow for the common individual trampled by uncaring higher forces. It's a thought process brought to life in a manner as riveting as it is despondent, with its intentionally grim nature being heightened by how Paths of Glory remains tragically relevant sixty years after its release.,