Reviewing my top 5 Movies of all Time
Day 2 – Glory
I have to admit at the beginning of the article today that I
am a Civil War fan. This isn’t to say
that I am a fan of war. And this isn’t
to say that I think even what we consider to be just wars are good. War is a terrible thing, even when they are done
for the best of reasons. War should
never be a first response. It should
only be the response when all other options seem to have failed us. I am also not the kind of person who has gone
to Civil War Reenactments, or any reenactment for that matter. While I do think dressing up in period
costume is cool, I am not always sure of the purpose of the people putting them
on, unless for historical study.
But I have been a kind of Civil War history nut since I was
10 years old. When I was 10 I went to
the school library and picked up a large history book of the Civil War. It contained information on each and every
battle, troupe movements, and the generals who were in command. It put each battle in context of the larger
civil war itself. I was enthralled. I wanted to learn each and every thing I
could about the era as possible. From
the History of Slavery, to the onset of the Civil War, to the Emancipation
Proclamation and beyond. I wanted to
learn it all. And when I was 10 I knew
just about as much as any 10 year old possibly could about the War Between the
States.
Obviously it’s been over 30 years since then, and as anyone
who has watched the game show Are You
Smarter than a Fifth Grader can attest, we forget a lot in the intervening
time period. I could tell you a little
bit about some of the major Generals and their history. And Ken Burn’s documentary on the Civil War
helped me recall some of the names and faces of the major players involved in
the conflict, but nothing can match the knowledge I had at 10 years old. Suffice it to say, I have known a lot, and
forgot a lot in the interim.
So when I was a sophomore in high school and a friend
mentioned to me about a Civil War movie coming out, I was excited. But I had one major hurdle to cross. I know for some of you out there, you won’t
understand this, but for those who do, I was not able to watch rated R films at
that time. I couldn’t just walk into a
movie and watch one. I know some of my
friends who could pass for 17, but I could not.
It just so happens that I lucked out when my parents had been told by
people that they trusted at their church that there was an amazing Civil War
movie out that had really nothing wrong with it except some accurate depictions
of violence in war. That convinced my
parents to allow us to go, albeit with them in the audience. So I remember sitting back for my first R
rated movie, and a Civil War movie at that, excited to there for the show.
If I was worried or not, I did not have any reasons to
be. The Cast was high powered, although
I would say that at the time they weren’t necessarily all that well known. And those who were did not necessarily have
the type of resume that you would think warrant a big screen historical epic of
that magnitude. First there was Matthew
Broderick, probably the primary male lead of the piece. He was best known for Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.
And he had done some musical theater as well. While I enjoyed Ferris immensely, being one
of the quintessential 80's movies dealing with uniquely first world problems of
teen angst, I would never have said that he would have had the capacity for
such a dramatic effort. Then there was
Cary Elwes, he of an amazing romantic comedy, The Princess Bride, that was a kind of sweeping epic, but more on
the comedy end of the spectrum. He had
done some other minor work previously but nothing with the depth of Glory in mind, and nothing that I had
seen. Of course there was Morgan
Freeman, which if you have read my previous piece on Shawshank Redemption will note that he did have some movie
background, specifically Lean on Me up to that point. And he had made Driving Miss Daisy, which had come out that same year. But aside from that, he just had a ton of TV
work that he had been involved with. I
remembered him from the Electric Company, which I occasionally watched as a
child. I had seen Lean on Me, and that made me hopeful, but that was about it. Denzel Washington, who would earn an academy
award for his performance, had been in mostly TV work with the exception of Cry
Freedom (also nominated), which I wouldn’t watch until after I had seen
Glory. He was definitely a promising
actor but nothing would prepare me for his role of Private Trip. And there were tons of smaller roles as
well. From the Irish Drill Sergeant to
Andre Braugher, as Thomas Searles, one of Robert Shaw’s close African-American friends
who would join the first African American regiment, to Bob Gunton’s portrayal
of General Garrsion Harker, as a conniving war profiteer, the roles were
plentiful and amazingly well written. I
could go on and on.
Freddy Francis, the cinematographer of Glory, had done some
amazing work in black and white on The
Elephant Man, and had done some rich work in otherworldly lands, working
with David Lynch once again, in Dune. These experiences would serve him well in
Glory, dealing with both intimate moments, which would capture the men dealing
with private reflections or the singing of the men before a battle, to more
wide sweeping moments, such as Robert Shaw setting his horse free and walking
through his men out to the front of the lines before the battle. He was able to capture beautifully the chaos
of war, and at the same time preserve the humanity of each individual soldier
involved.
Ed Zwick up to this point in time had done mostly TV work,
with the exception of the film About Last Night, which in no ways would lead
one to believe what he would be able to do here. With Glory, Zwick was able to tell a sweeping
tale of the first African American Regiment to see battle during the Civil
War. With his deft directing and Kevin
Jarre’s brilliant screenplay, Zwick was beautifully able to display the chaos
and riggers of war with an initial battle where Shaw seems to be utterly lost
in the midst of everything going on. And
from there he was able to develop the characters of the men who would
ultimately lead this regiment into battle, as well as the men themselves. From small moments of watching the doctors
treat Private Trip’s (Denzel Washington’s) back as a result of being whipped for
deserting his post, to larger grandiose moments where the soldiers, and later
Shaw himself, refuse to take their pay because they were being underpaid just
because they were black, Zwick develops these characters so that when they go
into battle that we actually care about them.
He then ably moves the unit through early battles and through dealing
with being misused to see the growth of the unit and them seeing each other as
brothers as they are about to go off into the final battle. Finally Zwick leads us through a final battle,
with James Horner’s operatic score playing in the background, showing both the
beauty of a unit moving as one cause to one purpose and the tragedy of losing
these men for a battle that day they would eventually lose.
But the beauty of Glory and telling the story of all of
these individual men and their heroic efforts during the Civil War is not in
the fact that most of them would die in battle and never live to see what
happened. The beauty of these men was in
rallying others to join their cause and come after them to fight a war that
would earn them their recognition as human beings worthy of the same rights as
others, and not as pieces of property.
The ran the risk of certain death by a bullet or even being captured,
because the south announced they would execute any black man in a Union
military uniform, or any white men who was leading said unit. They were heroes. Lincoln believed that the black soldiers were
responsible for turning the tide of the war in their favor.
So why is Glory in my top 5 movies of all time? I think you could run down the list. From the amazing writing and direction, to
the incredible portrayal of these men, none of which you feel like you don’t
know or are rooting for by the time they get to the final battle, to the
beautiful cinematography, I find myself enraptured in the piece every time I
sit down to watch it. There are some
movies that I can watch multiple times.
But there are very few that every time I see it on I will stop and sit
and watch all the way to the end. Glory
is just one of those films. It’s a
beautifully told historical epic.
This film is perfectly toasty
Five Stars
*Up Next in the Top 5 Casablanca*
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