Breaker Morant (1980)

A man in a white shirt with suspenders stands with hands behind his back, facing a line of soldiers under the large text "Breaker Morant.
The cover art for the 1980 movie Breaker Morant, directed by Bruce Beresford.
About the movie
  • Director: Bruce Beresford
  • Starring: Edward Woodward, Jack Thompson, John Waters
  • Yes or no?: Yes
  • Links: on Letterboxd, IMDb page
Other reviews:

Another in my Criterion Challenge, this one covering the Australian movie category.

This moved really slowly and brought out some old feelings about Edward Woodward, for some reason. The talks of movies the adults around me were having about when I was a kid are starting to come into focus. My dad thought Woodward was awesome and loved the television show The Equalizer that he starred in during the 1980s. Aside from the show, I had never heard of him.

As the movie chugged along, I was unfortunately a bit bored. I am familiar with and enjoy other trial movies, and as for military trials, Paths of Glory crushed it in this regard. This one was a slow burn, but it paid off really well and it hurt.

The moral ambiguity I felt throughout was heavy. Morant was seemingly presented as a sympathetic character who was following orders, and literally based his defense on that. But he was bad—really bad. I’ve never been in a war, so I have no idea what happens when confronted with a situation such as the movie gave us. It seems to me, though, that one very strict rule would be don’t shoot prisoners. Perhaps these are the things that necessitated “rules” for war. If so, good.

Morant, while honorable in the end, isn’t worth rooting for. Bryan Brown’s Peter Handcock was a pretty decent-seeming guy. He was following orders. And he had a mind for talking about it. I liked his demeanor, despite it not helping.

The sham trial, and the subsequent seclusion (alluded to in the epilogue) of Major Thomas (Jack Thompson) shows how much pain was felt. The faces on the soldier who had to execute the killing showed that as well. Morant was railroaded, but it wasn’t for no reason. As he said, the Empire needed scapegoats. Morant just did a terrible thing at the wrong time.

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January 12, 2025
Tags: Criterion Challenge | slap | John Waters | Bruce Beresford | Jack Thompson | Edward Woodward