Glory

Review 1 of 1

SallyB writes:

4of 4 Stars

Reading other reviews of this film, I am struck by what seems to be other reviewers ignorance of history. Many seemed to complain about the casting of Matthew Broderick as Col. Robert Gould Shaw, saying that he was entirely too young to play this part and that he was given facial hair merely to age him a bit. What those other reviewers seem to be missing is that the real Robert Gould Shaw was two years younger than Broderick was when he filmed this movie. Shaw was 25 when he died, Broderick was 27 when he made the film. Shaw wore facial hair in the style of what is called "The Imperial", that being a mustache and a goatee, and having Broderick do the same was perfectly in keeping in character for the role he was playing and was not, in fact, a contrivance to make him look older than he was supposed to be.

Shaw was also, like Broderick, slight of build, diminutive of size and very youthful looking, which seemed to be yet another complaint about the casting of Broderick for this role. Sure, he is best known for wise-cracking comic characters like Ferris Bueller, but this film seemed to allow Broderick to stretch his wings a bit and to show us his ability to pull off a dramatic lead in a historical film, and he accomplished it poignantly. By the end of the film, you genuinely care about Shaw as well as his men, and when the deadly assault on Fort Wagner happens, you know that few of them will survive the night.

My only wish with this film was that they had told the real story instead of largely making it up. The real story of Shaw and the 54th is far and away more dramatic than the one that the film portrayed. But I suppose that Hollywood felt that such a thing might bore audiences, and so they had to make up characters that would create a memorable story. We meet Thomas Searles, a free, comfortable, affluent and educated black who is the first one to join the new "colored" unit when he hears the news. We also meet three escaped slaves: Tripp, an angry, rebellious slave from Tennessee who fights his fellow soldiers as well as himself before learning how to become a real soldier, Jupiter Sharts, a baby-faced, stuttering slave who must learn self-confidence in order to overcome obstacles, and finally, John Rawlins, a gravedigger who we meet at the beginning of the film in the aftermath of the Battle of Antietam who finds Shaw unconscious on the battlefield, and who helps to meld all these disparate personalities together to become a cohesive fighting unit, and earns, for his pains, the rank of Sergeant Major.

This film is a poignant exploration of four black soldiers and their white officers, and what it takes to meld them into a fighting unit while overcoming racial prejudice. It's a superb ensemble piece, never allowing any one person to hog the limelight, but exploring how all of these people overcame some obstacle to fight what was obviously a doomed battle, but that would open the floodgates for other black regiments to form and tip the balance in favour of the Union. Each man makes a journey to the end that changes them. Some survive, most do not. Unless you are extremely hard of heart, you can't watch the ending and not weep for these men's sacrifice for each other. A powerful film that has become a minor classic in its own right, and deservedly so. Arguably Matthew Broderick's finest screen work and one that he will long be remembered for.

Apr 12, 2006 15:06:45