Vientiane, meanwhile, “is exceptional, but inconvenient. But it was a week before I boarded another train.” I was determined to deal with Afghanistan swiftly and put that discomfort into parentheses. True, there was a war in Baluchistan, but Baluchistan was small. I had not been there long before I regretted having changed my plans to take the southern route. The food smells of cholera, travel there is always uncomfortable and sometimes dangerous, and the Afghans are lazy, idle, and violent. Even the hippies have begun to find it intolerable. Now Afghanistan is expensive but just as barbarous as before. ![]() But there was a military coup in 1973, and the king (who was sunning himself in Italy) was deposed. ![]() Formerly it was cheap and barbarous, and people went there to buy lumps of hashish-they would spend weeks in the filthy hotels of Herat and Kabul, staying high. Here meanwhile we have an example in one hit of a country sketch and an historical moment: Afghanistan. The railway bazaar, with its gadgets and passengers, represented the society so completely that to board it was to be challenged by the national character.” “The trains in any country contain the essential paraphernalia of the culture: Thai trains have the shower jar with the glazed dragon on its side, Singhalese ones the car reserved for Buddhist monks, Indian ones a vegetarian kitchen and six classes, Iranian ones prayer mats, Malaysian ones a noodle stall, Vietnamese ones bulletproof glass on the locomotive, and on every carriage of a Russian train there is a samovar. Theroux in fact thinks the essence can perhaps be seen on the trains of each country themselves: But there’s a skill to capturing some essence of nations (if you agree there’s an essence that can be caught) and Theroux has it. Theroux’s sketches of countries are necessarily quite brief, and of the broad-stroke variety. So much has changed in the region, and yet in some ways, when one takes a distant view, somehow so little. From a Southeast Asian perspective, we found it compelling not just as a piece of travel writing, but rather more so as an historical work. Theroux’s trip took place 45 years ago, perhaps making the book interesting today in a way somewhat different to how it was in 1975. Southeast Asia forms a solid and interesting chunk of the trip: Burma (Myanmar), Laos, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and Vietnam all get decent coverage. Yet Theroux’s blend of reportage and travel writing-now more history than anything else-seduces the reader into coming along for the four-month ride, country after country, thanks to his ability to capture the excitement of the possibilities of a train ride.īeginning in London, Theroux heads to Europe, the Middle East, India, Southeast Asia and Japan, before returning by the Trans-Siberian Railway. Tomatometer Understated to a fault, The Railway Man transcends its occasionally stodgy pacing with a touching, fact-based story and the quiet chemistry of its stars.There’s not really a point to Theroux’s meandering train trip from Europe and through Asia-not even a contrived one such as searching for the perfect meal, as Anthony Bourdain does in A Cook’s Tour. Riëtte Grobler Besonderse blik op oorlogwondeĭavid Rooney Saga of suffering a plodder. Theresa Smith Path of moving on leads to the past Read the Classification Guidelines.ĬommonSenseMedia Report (USA) Suggested age limit If you have a problem with any of the above, please take it up directly with the FPB. Material contains complex and mature themes Moderate impact, implied, psychological, physical, realistic, justified by context of war Low to mild impact scenes of affections (hugging and kissing) Scroll down for embedded trailer Film and Publications Board (FPB) Report (SA) Genre Official Site | IMDB page | ScreenIt Report | CommonSenseMedia Report ![]() Frank Cottrell Boyce, Andy Paterson, from the book by Eric LomaxĪrcher Street Productions, Latitude Media, Lionsgate, Pictures in Paradise, Silver Reel, Thai Occidental Productions
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