The Narrow Road to the Deep North (Amazon Prime)
Jacob Elordi stars in this impressive, sweeping Australian war epic
What’s it about? Burma Railway in 1943 and across the Pacific during World War II charts the cruelty of war, the tenuousness of life, and the impossibility of love, as seen through the eyes of an Australian doctor and prisoner of war.
Who it’s for? Fans of epic war dramas, those who appreciate storytelling that mixes romance with brutality, Jacob Elordi lovers, if you admire Justin Kurzel’s movies (The Order, Nitram, Macbeth), admirers of ace cinematography and direction
Who should avoid? If you’re looking for fast pace and action, if you dislike nonlinear storytelling, those looking for an easy watch, if you have trouble with Australian accents
Watch if you like: The Thin Red Line, Gallipoli, Band of Brothers, The English Patient
News and Notes:
Released on April 18th
Premiered at Berlinale 2025
5 episodes
Schmear’s Verdict: The Narrow Road to the Deep North is a sweeping, beautifully crafted saga of love, war, and survival.
You could say that Justin Kurzel makes the same movie again and again, and you wouldn’t be wrong—treatises on masculinity, violence, and the co-mingling of the two. The Narrow Road to the Deep North is no exception, at least through the first two episodes. Adapted from Richard Flanagan’s 2014 Booker Prize-winning novel, it’s a textbook saga: cinematic to the hilt, an Aussie epic filled with bloodshed, romance, and grand sweep.
I was pretty damn compelled by the two episodes that premiered. This stars Jacob Elordi as Dorrigo, a womanizing poet-medic in the 1940s during Australia’s Pacific War campaign. Ciarán Hinds—lights-out amazing—plays Dorrigo in 1988. He’s incredible, carrying an ominous weight, a mix of wisdom and pain.
I’m still not entirely sold on Elordi. His physicality remains his best feature—Kurzel puts that to good use, focusing on his ripped traps as he beds one of the many women he pursues in the show. It’s effectively Paul Schrader’s Oh, Canada all over again, where Elordi’s older self was played by Richard Gere with far more pathos. Everyone around him just sparkles a little more—whether it’s Odessa Young as his love interest in the 1940s timeline or Simon Baker as his uncle.
Kurzel’s filmmaking more than makes up for it. These are the best-crafted images of his career. Early on, Dorrigo’s battalion is captured by the Japanese, packed into a train car, and sent to Thailand to build the titular “narrow road”—a Sisyphean railway through the jungle. The mass of bodies in the train car is just one of many stunning tableaus, along with the brutal construction of the railway and the indefatigable spirit of these Aussies splashing in a tropical river.
With its POW story, this calls to mind Band of Brothers or Gallipoli. Outside of that, in both the ’40s and ’80s storylines, there’s some steamy melodrama. I was pleasantly surprised by the sensitivity and romantic flair Kurzel brings to this—a necessary counterbalance to the horrors of war.
That said, the format is questionable. The two timelines naturally sap some pure intensity from the story, especially since there’s no overriding propulsive mystery aside from knowing how truly awful the 1940s imprisonment was. Kurzel makes no bones about showing the POW camp at its worst.
The pacing is deliberate—slow enough for my seat neighbor to doze off—and I worry about how this will play on the small screen. This is a five-episode series, though it feels like cinema. When this hits TV screens, it demands full immersion to really lose yourself in the story.
