Post by telegonus on Jul 3, 2018 23:36:59 GMT
I had an interesting discussion with a friend the other night on war and prison escape movies, and Stalag 17 came up as a good one we agreed upon but for one major thing: the character of Sefton, played by William Holden, and his reasons for helping the respected upper class POW, Lt. Dunbar, escape at the end of the movie. My friend said that the motivation of wheeler and dealer Sefton was based entirely on selfishness: Sefton was already under suspicion by the other men as an informer, and generally disliked by the other POWs. He claimed to expect a reward from Dunbar's wealthy family, a major motivation in his (Sefton's) willingness to take such a risk as to help Dunbar escape. In a key dramatic scene Sefton had exposed the real informer, which earned him some grudging respect from the other prisoners.
My contention was that Sefton, while a cynic and an "operator" who sold cigarettes, candy and other valued items he conned out of the guards, with whom he did "business", was actually, at the core, an okay guy, and that the film showed this coming out when he was tested (spurned and then beaten up badly by his fellow prisoners for his dealings with the Germans, for money, not information on planned escapes, as things turned out--and thus not an informer) he proved that he had the makings of a hero. My friend, trained in European history (though not in psychology) claimed that Sefton was merely an opportunist, his seeming heroism in working with Dunbar in his daring and from what the viewer can tell successful escape, was merely an extension of his innate selfishness and opportunism.
As I saw it, the character of Sefton was an extreme instance of American individualism, so strong as to make him come off to his fellow prisoners as a bad actor, a guy with what we'd now call an attitude problem; in other words, someone you can't trust. The movie, and the play it was based on, showed Americans as flawed, often extremely so, and yet capable of rising to the occasion and achieving true heroism. Sefton, in other words, changed; and he evolved; thus when faced with the opportunity to prove himself to be a hero, he did just that. By the end of the movie his cynicism had become a mask (it probably always was, to a degree). He showed his true colors in helping Dunbar escape, and going along with him; and yet he chose to retain the mask of his "public self", as his fellow prisoners knew him, as a somewhat ironic gesture on his part, providing the movie a true hero after all, if a somewhat ambivalent one.