Paths of Glory (1957) Review

“See that cockroach? Tomorrow morning, we'll be dead and it'll be alive. It'll have more contact with my wife and child than I will. I'll be nothing, and it'll be alive.”
   Paths of Glory is considered to be on of the best WWI films, so is it any surprise that Stanley Kubrick directed it?  The story starts off with General Mireau, a conceited man, who orders Dax and men on a pointless suicide mission against the Germans on the unachievable Ant Hill. After the unavoidable fiasco, which killed many men, Mireau orders three men to be executed for cowardice. Dux who was once a lawyer and now a colonel is the only reasonable person standing up for this injustice done to the men. He attempts to defend the men during their unfair trial even though he knows it’s pointless because the sentence is already made. He knows it’s all about the politics of war.
     The ending has a great impact on the viewer. Dax has given up on humanity when he hears whistling and shouting. He stares through the window expecting that the men may soon be assaulting the poor woman who is about to come and sing to them. Once she steps into the room the men get rowdier. She’s quiet and almost afraid. Dax puts his head down in shame because he expects what will come next, but as soon as she opens her mouth to sing there’s silence. The men have comprehended that she is a regular person, a ravishing victim of their war efforts, she’s trapped in a threatening condition she didn’t ask to be apart of. She is trapped and her outliving the war seems uncertain. The soldiers become ashamed at their ability to cut off their emotions so easily and become easily brutal. They look at what they’ve become and become teary-eyed. Dax witnesses this and it gives him a small glimmer of hope that humanity might have a chance. 
   Paths of Glory is my second favorite WWI film behind All Quiet on the Western Front (1930). This film is an outstanding piece of cinema. It shows the senselessness of war, where soldiers are simply treated like numbers instead of human beings. The battle scenes are quite good. The cast provides stellar performances. It’s safe to say there is no glory in Paths of Glory. Kubrick provided the viewer with a wide range of what humanity is truly capable of from the cruelest injustices to moments of beauty. Surprisingly about roughly 30 years later Kubrick gave us another great war film… Full Metal Jacket.

4.9 out of 5