The film stars Jim Sturgess, Colin Farrell, Ed Harris, and Saoirse Ronan, with Alexandru Potocean, Sebastian Urzendowsky, Gustaf Skarsgård, Dragoș Bucur and Mark Strong.

[2] During World War II, after the Soviet invasion of Poland, young Polish army officer Janusz Wieszczek is held as a prisoner and interrogated by the NKVD.

There he meets those with whom he later plans an escape: Mr. Smith, an American engineer; Khabarov, an actor; Valka, a hardened Russian criminal; Tomasz, a Polish artist; Voss, a Latvian priest; Kazik, a Pole suffering from night blindness; and Zoran, a Yugoslav accountant.

At times, Janusz seems to hallucinate the front door of a country home and adjoining window ledge, which holds plants and a rock he attempts to reach for.

There they meet Irena, a young Polish girl, who tells them that Russian soldiers murdered her parents and sent her to a collective farm near Warsaw, where they treated her cruelly, so she escaped.

Smith notices the inaccuracies in her story, as Warsaw is occupied by the Germans; nevertheless, despite his misgivings that she'll slow them down and tax their meager food supply, he agrees with the group to let her in.

Janusz realises that Mongolia is under communist control and since China is at war with Japan, tells the group they should take refuge in British India.

Smith is on the verge of death, but after being motivated by Janusz, Zoran, and Voss, decides to rejoin the group and the severely dehydrated four find a much-needed water source.

[5] Though the director Peter Weir continues to claim that the so-called long walk happened, he himself now describes The Way Back as "essentially a fictional film".

The critics consensus is: "It isn't as emotionally involving as it should be, but this Peter Weir epic offers sweeping ambition and strong performances to go with its grand visual spectacle.