The first look at Prisoner of War, a World War II survival drama headlined by action stalwart Scott Adkins (John Wick: Chapter 4), has landed, promising an unflinching interrogation of human endurance that transcends the usual battlefield spectacle.
The film chronicles the harrowing ordeal of British Wing Commander James Wright (Adkins), thrust into the crucible of April 1942’s Battle of Bataan. Deployed to the Philippines in a desperate Allied bid to hold off advancing Japanese forces, his mission collapses, leaving him captured and condemned to a prison camp with a brutal reputation.
There, things take an unexpected turn. Lieutenant Colonel Ito (Peter Shinkoda – “Falling Skies”), the camp’s calculating commanding officer, learns that Wright trained in traditional Japanese martial arts before the war. What starts as captivity quickly shifts into something more personal — a series of brutal, bare-knuckle fights against Ito’s top soldiers. It’s a twisted kind of trial, less about punishment than domination. For Wright, each fight is a test of resilience — because losing means death, but giving in would mean something harder to live with.
Helmed by Louis Mandylor (3 Days in Malay, Operation Bloodhunt), written by Mark Clebanoff from an original story by Adkins, and also starring Michael Copon (“One Tree Hill”), Prisoner of War eschews sprawling war spectacle in favor of a deft and gritty fusion of authentic period detail with raw, unadorned combat — all underscored by a powerful meditation on perseverance.
Prisoner of War will be available in cinemas and on VOD September 19.
