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Whatever life holds in store for me, I will never forget these words: "With great power comes great responsibility."
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Major Shears is a major character in the 1957 war film, The Bridge on the River Kwai. He's an American Navy sailor, who served as a long-time prisoner in a British POW camp.
He was portrayed by the late William Holden.
Biography[]
He was private who exchanged his clothes with a dead officer, impersonating said officer to obtain the extra privileges that come with the rise in rank of a "commander". He's first introduced as one of two current, long-time prisoners, digging graves to bury comrades within a camp from the Southeast Asian Burmese/Siamese jungle Sweltering, Shears notices the new arrivals and jokes that they might run away. Shears and his Australian companion Weaver are placed on the sick list after bribing the Japanese Captain with a cigarette lighter. Shears has no commitment or adherence to any specific code or ideal other than to himself and his own survival. He just wants to stay alive and eventually escape, as he turns and brashly offers a mocking eulogy for one of his compatriots just interred. Shears watches Saito give a speech and British officer Colonel Nicholson refuse to surrender with a mixture of amusement and disgust, and he condescendingly mocks the scene from the open-air hospital hut at a distance. He tells the touring Nicholson that he and the Australian are the only remaining survivors of the original POWs who built the camp. As Shears is examined by Army POW Doctor Major Clipton on a cot, he tells Nicholson not to worry about him, as he was in no hurry to get off the sick list. In a late-night meeting between Nicholson and his officers, attended also by Shears and Clipton, the men contemplate the odds of successful escape and survival. Nicholson determines that escape is not only impossible but not permitted. The next morning, Saito and Nicholson continue to argue about their rigid military codes, and eventually Nicholson's summoned into Saito's headquarters. Moments later, Nicholson is dragged to a corrugated metal-encased sweat box, called "the oven". Shears, and two other prisoners, (the Aussie Corporal Weaver and British Lieutenant Jennings) take advantage of this, and Shears successfully manages to escape from the camp into the almost impenetrable jungle (though his companions don't make it) but he is shot and falls into a rushing river. He manages to swim to safety down-river. For the next couple of days, he's cared for and honored in the local village, until he eventually leaves and rows downriver, only to collapse and drift out into the open ocean (where he is later picked up by the British). Shears reached British intelligence headquarters, and is treated in Mount Lavinia Hospital (Ceylon). While cavorting on the beach of the British base with an attractive blonde nurse, Shears stated that he wanted to live life again as a normal civilian. Suddenly, he's introduced to Major Warden, a British officer in charge of Force 316, who's interested in intelligence information regarding the railway at the prison camp, wanting Shears' aid "in a very special sense." The next morning, Shears meets at Warden's headquarters in the Botanical Gardens, a "commando school" to train special forces in "sabotage and demolition" and the use of PE ("plastic explosives"), where he's mistakenly attacked by one of the trainees. Inside, Shears is shown where he was held prisoner on a map of Siam. Warden explains how he knew the Japanese wanted to open up the Bangkok-Rangoon railway by the middle of May and, planned a sabotage raid to destroy the Kwai Bridge. Shears' local knowledge would be invaluable, but Shears isn't interested in returning to the jungle after being reassigned to the British Force 316. He calmly explains to Warden how he wasn't even a real officer, but Warden reveals that he knew the truth about Shears' status for a very long time, thanks to his service record. Shears is left with no choice but to accept an assignment to go back to the camp and destroy the Kwai Bridge.