The Man Who Would Be King

My friend threw this DVD at my head one night while we were arguing about film. I said all adventure movies left me feeling a little hollow - adventure movies tended to abandon story, really, in favor of plot (important distinction: stories are interesting, plots boring; consequently a film with a story to tell is better than a movie with a plot to move forward). I think he hurled the disc at me out of pure frustration with my point of view. In doing so, he also won the argument.

The Man Who Would Be King is the single greatest adventure film I've ever seen. It's a story - It's a tale - It's not a series of plot developments (to me, to go further with this plot/story dichotomy, a plot is mechanical (and sometimes that machine is well-oiled) while a story is organic and feels less contrived (though the story, as organic matter sometimes is, can be rotten)). It's a very good story at that. The Man Who Would Be King (I believe as a result of its derivation from Kipling) has a depth and development of character that is foreign to most adventure tales. Few films are as rousing as this and few films that are this rousing have nearly as much to say about mankind.

John Huston, of course, is a master of instilling greatness into traditionally tedious genres. He transformed the mystery, the western, the swashbuckler. Why not the adventure story too? As evidenced in The Maltese Falcon and Treasure of the Sierra Madre, Huston can take what might wind up a plot and transform it into a story. He understands that characters - human, conflicted, devious characters - are essential to creating genre pictures that transcend their genre. Without Huston, this film would have undoubtedly faltered; his steady and determined hand guides this film from the hazards of superficiality without sacrificing entertainment and adventure.

He does not create a great film single-handedly though, as Connery and Caine, who both give tremendous performances, bestow upon Peachy and Daniel immense likability despite their scoundrel airs. Caine proves again why he may be the greatest living British actor and Connery reminds us that there's more to him than 007.

As I said, this is one of the greatest adventure tales brought to the screen. Though some may disagree, in particular my friend who threw the DVD at my head, it's better than any of the late 30s swashbucklers and better than most shoot-em-ups made since.

Outside of the obvious reflections on the immoral and absurdly hypocritical nature of early British colonialism, it's just a damn entertaining movie.

But you have to think that Rudyard Kipling, who grew up under British rule in India, was certainly trying to shake some sensibilities when he first wrote the story as part of an 1890 package called The Man Who Would Be King and Other Stories, nearly a century before it was made into a film and during an era when the British Empire was still very much a reality.

From the perceptive realization that even the staunchly important Masonic Lodge -- which had infilitrated every aspect of Britain's upper classes -- could be easily corrupted; to the arrogance as Sean Connery's character Daniel Dravot, who elevates what he sees as mere social superiority into a god-like status; to the inevitable humbling of both men at the hands of the 'savages' they profess to rule, the film is ultimately about the humility all men should exhude, particularly in the face of the unfamiliar.

Kipling's tale also preached tolerance, though you might not consider that to be the case based on the film's climax: consider that if Daniel and Peachy had shown an iota of respect for the religion that they instead decided to fleece, how differently the tale might have played out.

The film owes much of its success to the chemistry between Caine and Connery, who regardless of later plaudits, gave the finest performances of their careers. Connery is particularly nuanced, with Daniel Dravot starting the tale as a somewhat lackwitted second fiddle to the scheming Peachy but later seeing his limited vision help him surpass his friend in terms of villainy with an equally heavy price. Caine plays, to some degree or another, the same charming British sheyster/teddy boy he popularized in the Harry Palmer films. But without a backdrop of similarly disaffected cockney bad guys, it's stunningly effective.

John Huston's direction is among the best of his career, and in terms of his ability to use both sprawling vistas and tight, almost claustrophobic photography, owes a nod to his earlier work, including The African Queen, Night of the Iguana and the Treasure of the Sierra Madre. As examples, witness the zenith of Peachy and Daniel's hazardous trek through the mountains played out in full panoramic detail, only to be followed 90 minutes later by the tight shot of Kipling's face, the revulsion fairly etched into every crease as we reach the climax.

But perhaps the true hero of this film was Boaty Boatright, who also cast Connery's classic "The Wind and The Lion." He managed to take some of the most strident, forceful personalities in the film industries, threw them together and came up with a film about humility. Magic.

Why is this film not given more recognition? It was one of those films that I had always heard about but had never seen. Well, I saw it the other day and I am shocked that I wasn't forced to watch this years ago. It is an amazing film. I have a hard time coming up with something that was wrong with it. The highlights, of course, were the performances of Caine and Connery. Nearly every user comment for this film has said how good their chemistry was, well I read all these comments before seeing the film and was still blown away by how good the chemistry was. Connery in particular was a surprise to me, even though Caine probably gave the better performance of the two.

As a Brit living in the US, it is hard to get Americans to really understand subtle aspects of British life (the optimism, the humour, the strength of character)... so I now have three movies that I tell people to watch in order to get a better idea of what it means to be British: The Bridge on the River Kwai, Zulu, and The Man Who Would Be King.

No director ever personalized a genre the way John Huston could. While some critics have claimed his style was a 'lack' of style, the opposite is actually true; his sense of irony, love of the absurd, respect for personal codes of honor, and twist endings that always remind us that the true value of a journey is not arriving at a destination, but in the 'getting there' all set apart his best work from that of his contemporaries. Even his lesser work has value, and his best films, which certainly includes THE MAN WHO WOULD BE KING, are unforgettable.

The tragicomic tale of two ex-Sergeants turned confidence men with a grand scheme to fleece a near-legendary kingdom had been a 'pet' project of Huston's since the forties, and he'd spent years tinkering with the script, planning to film it with Clark Gable and Humphrey Bogart in the leads. With Bogart's death in 1957, he'd considered various other match-ups (including Richard Burton and Peter O'Toole), until he found the ideal pair, in Sean Connery and Michael Caine. Connery had just finished the spectacular THE WIND AND THE LION (in which Huston played a small, but memorable role), and the Scot had often been compared to Gable with his dark good looks, machismo, and lack of pretense. Michael Caine, a long-time friend of Connery, was one of the industry's busiest actors, and had already proved himself adept at playing both soldiers and con men. Together, Connery and Caine had a camaraderie and chemistry that even Gable and Bogart couldn't have equaled, and Huston was "quite pleased".

Christopher Plummer was another inspired piece of casting, as the legendary author Rudyard Kipling. Bookish, with a keen intellect and rich sense of humor, Plummer's Kipling, sharing Masonic ties with the future 'Kings', is the perfect foil for the duo, offering sound advice which they totally disregard, with a wink and a smile. As Dravot (Connery) tells him, "We are not little men", and India, bound up in British bureaucracy (as well as becoming too 'hot' for them) could never provide the immensity of riches they dreamed of.

Huston eschewed the 'traditional' approach to adventure films, with cardboard heroes performing near-impossible deeds until the inevitable 'happy ending', and grounded his story in reality, which disappointed any viewers hoping KING would simply be a variation of GUNGA DIN. But in not romanticizing the story, he gives it a sense of immensity and the exotic, a richness of character, and an understanding of human frailties that far surpasses a typical Hollywood product. While Dravot orchestrates the pair's ultimate ruin by taking his 'godhood' too seriously (as he turns 'noble', trying to bring order to his 'kingdom', and decides to start a dynasty by taking a wife), you can understand why Carnehan (Caine), seeing their 'get rich' scheme disintegrate, would be anxious to leave, but also why he would forgive his friend, when they face torture and certain death. Loyalty, to Huston, is not lip service, but a true measure of a man. While Dravot and Carnehan are certainly not role models, their love and respect for each other transcends their faults, even their lives, putting the film's final scene, as a physically crushed Carnehan leaves his 'bundle' for Kipling, into perspective. It is a moment you won't soon forget.

THE MAN WHO WOULD BE KING proves, yet again, why John Huston, as he once described his friend, Humphrey Bogart, is "irreplaceable".

It's interesting to look through the negative reviews of The Man Who Would Be King. Those submitted twenty years ago reflect the range of subjective response you might expect from any film. Move forward to those submitted in the last few years and a common theme arises. The film is "unwatchable" because it portrays people in a colonial era with a colonial perspective. Somehow it's assumed that the writer casting forth this judgement somehow from birth knew all that is right and just and can, without a shred of arrogance or hypocrisy, see clearly the sins of the past and guide the rest of us as to what is correct and incorrect for us to allow our weak eyes and ears to take in or avoid so that we can also live a similarly enlightened life.

Someday I hope those who so arrogantly seek to cancel or at least condemn any film from an earlier era that did not by some miracle anticipate what would be politically correct in 2022 will gain some humility. Hopefully they will then finally come to recognize that they too suffer from the flawed human condition and are blind to what the next generation will someday condemn them for.

If you want to see how great filmmaking was done before digital technology made it easy to create any setting, this is a great film to watch. If you want to see how people viewed the world in the colonial era - and - of you want to understand how those who lived through the Great Depression and WWII sought to portray the colonial era, this is a great film to watch. It's also a well told story if you have the ability to follow a story that unfolds slowly and doesn't flash from one action scene to another.

However, if you are like those who led the cultural revolution in China and believe that history must be eradicated or revised, I guess this is one of the cultural artifacts that must be destroyed. If that's you, I'll save you the time. You can add this to your censor list.