The Way Back - A Tall Tale Or A True Story?

11:11am UK, Monday December 27, 2010

Lisa Dowd, entertainment correspondent

Mystery surrounds an Oscar-tipped epic about a group of prisoners who escape a Soviet gulag and trek 4,500 miles to freedom.

Some feel The Way Back can't possibly be true, others are convinced it took place.

"Controversy does surround the question of whether the man who wrote the book was on the whole walk," says director Peter Weir, the man behind Master And Commander, Witness and Gallipoli.

"He was certainly a prisoner, so I decided to fictionalise it, change the title, re-name the characters and then draw on the experiences of others who'd been in the gulags."

The book first appeared in 1956 and no one has since found information to prove or disprove whether the author, Slavomir Rawicz's account really happened.

Getting out of the camp wasn't difficult at all, but it was surviving in the terrain that came after those walls that kept everyone together, no-one dared make a run for it, it almost seemed impossible.

Actor Jim Sturgess

Weir's pursuit of the truth took him to London, Moscow and Siberia.

"I wanted everything that was on the film, all the dialogue, everything sourced back to either an account in person or a book, so it would be deeply true."

The film follows the escapees across some of the world's most inhospitable terrain.

"There's a line in the film that says the walls are not your prison, Siberia is your prison," says actor Jim Sturgess.

"Getting out of the camp wasn't difficult at all, but it was surviving in the terrain that came after those walls that kept everyone together, no-one dared make a run for it, it almost seemed impossible."

Director Peter Weir says the author was definitely a prisoner

Colin Farrell, Ed Harris and 16-year-old Saoirse Ronan also star in the film which highlights Stalin's brutal prison regime.

"It's good to have a female presence in the group and bring a certain kind of energy to the group," says Ronan, who plays an orphan who the prisoners stumble across.

"Before that it was all just blokes! I only shot in Bulgaria and Morocco - these guys shot in India as well which looks amazing by the way, it was very beautiful."