MovieChat Forums > Colditz (2005) Discussion > (SPOILERS) Last escape from Willis

(SPOILERS) Last escape from Willis


I just saw the movie for the second time, but I've a question that's still unanswered.
In the end when they tell Willis that their forces are approaching, and they are almost rescues. He says "that's not good enough".

Does he mean that:
- it's not fast enough
- he want's to get out of there on his one
- something else?

Thank you in advance!

--
Richard van Schaik

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I think it refers to 2 possibilities:

1. He couldn't wait any longer to be free - not even another minute.

2. He wanted to prove he could escape on his own without being rescued.

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I think he was so obsessed with getting out on his own, that this was all he could think about. He seemed insane at this point, (SPOILER WARNING!!!) as shown when he "escaped" and it really was not the beautiful country lane he seemed to think it was, but more of the prison yard (or something- couldn't tell).

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Actually, I think you all missed the even sadder meaning behind that line. In a previous scene, Willis is shown talking to his buddies about how when he was a kid, his father used to demand that he and his brother be the best at everything. He tells how their dad would even force them to pitch their tents in the garden, blindfolded, so they would later win at a scouting contest. The man was obsessed with his boys being the best at everything, and it has obviously affected Willis deeply. So all through the movie, he is so obsessive about escape. That's why he mentions earlier in the film, how the prisoners from other countries are making fools (his misperception) of the British prisoners, because they are beating the Brits at escaping. So Willis is absolutely hellbent on not being bested, just as he was forced to do when he was a boy. At the end, when he has been cheated out of his last chance to get out (and presumably redeem himself in his father's eyes), he is severely anguished. That's why, when he learns that the prisoners are going to be rescued soon, he is crushed, because he feels his father will consider him a failure for not having got the job done himself. The "No good... no good..." that comes out of his mouth is him voicing what he thinks his father would say, ie that Willis failed utterly, by being rescued by an outside agency. That is too much for him to take, and in his shattered state of mind, he walks out in the only way he has left of doing it himself. He's clearly in complete despair at this point. The dialog about his father is brief and easy to miss, but if you catch it, it gives a horrible tragic context to Willis' subconscious drive throughout the movie, and moreso to his final act of desperation. Fox's performance is so on-target, that last scene always kills me, very difficult to watch!

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Did you write the screenplay? That is pretty complete???

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