King and Country is a distinctive anti-war effort that won't be to all tastes but one which those in tune with director Joseph Losey's take on the material will find both fascinating and utterly involving. Those not on the director's wavelength -- or those who don't necessarily appreciate its anti-war message or its denunciation of class favoritism -- will have a different reaction and will most likely find King slow going and predictable. Indeed, it's the kind of story that has been told many times; but Losey and his writers believe there is still a great deal of truth in some familiar tales. What's interesting about Losey's technique is that he makes the piece somewhat Brechtian, raising some walls that make the audience aware that what it is watching is a distillation of real life rather than the real thing, an approach that works well with a court martial-themed piece, in that such trials are themselves distillations of real life that take place in a faux-theatrical setting, with the purported (though not always actual) aim of arriving at the truth. The artifice that Losey employs doesn't negate the drama, but somehow heightens it. He is helped by the adept performances of his cast. Dirk Bogarde turns in an expert performance that takes advantage of all opportunities to plumb the contradictions of his character. Leo McKern is magnificent as an immovable object battling an irresistible force. And above all, Tom Courtenay is pure gold as the Everyman who is a pawn in a game that he in no way understands.