The Four Feathers

In 1884, a British officer (Heath Ledger) resigns his commission rather than go to war and is branded with the white feather of cowardice by three friends and his fiancee (Kate Hudson). Stung by the rebuke, he sets out to redeem himself and return the feathers. Fine performances (especially Wes Bentley as the hero’s best friend) and lavish production values (including a spectacular desert battle scene) are the chief assets of this latest adaptation of A.E.W. Mason’s there’ll-always-be-an-England 1902 novel. It’s directed well by Shekhar Kapur, who deftly finesses Mason’s arch-colonialism without endorsing it, denying it or putting a smug postmodern spin on it. Drawbacks are a meandering script (by Michael Schiffer and Hossein Amini) and an inconclusive ending that leaves the major characters up in the air.