Glory

Glory is set during the American Civil War and is based on real events, namely the black soldiers' part in the victory of the Northern states. Colonel Robert Shaw is a young greenhorn who grows with the task of raising an infantry regiment of black soldiers. On the face of it this sounds like a good initiative, for the black men are burning to fight for their freedom. Unfortunately, the idea was in reality dreamt up by a military man who only wants the black men enlisted in the army so they can do all the drudgery the white soldiers will not touch. The military, however, has not reckoned with Shaw in this respect. He may have difficulty understanding the black men's mentality, but he respects their wish to fight on an equal footing with their white "brothers".

Shaw gets his way. After smaller, successful battles, his regiment is given the honour of spearheading a risky assault on one of the best-defended forts of the Southern states. Shaw and many of his men fall in heroic combat, but news of the black men's courage and skill spreads, so that black soldiers later come to make up a decisive force in the war.

Glory is a pompous film with noble intentions, and Matthew Broderick draws a good and complex portrait of Colonel Shaw. There are also good roles for black actors, and Denzel Washington won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor as the rebellious Trip, who rightly harbours no hopes about the Union army's treatment of its black privates. Glory is, however, a bit too high-flown for me. There is too much long-drawn-out wallowing in the characters' honourable qualities.