Glory (Blu-ray)

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Some stories are so compelling that they all but tell themselves. "Glory" is probably one of the best Civil War films ever made, and yet I'm not sure that the credit should go to director Edward Zwick ("Legends of the Fall," "The Last Sammurai"), or even talented stars like Matthew Broderick, Denzel Washington, Cary Elwes, or Morgan Freeman. This story is bigger than all of them. It absorbs them, it takes the shine off their celebrity and makes them just one piece of the unit--just like the soldiers the actors play. Even lead actor Broderick, who plays the 23-year-old son of an influential Boston abolitionist called upon to command an all-black regiment, seems dwarfed by the enormity of the narrative and all its implications. And what adds impact is that it's based on truth.

The very first thing we're told is that the film is based on letters written from young Col. Robert Gould Shaw (Broderick) that are now housed in the Houghton Library at Harvard. And sure enough, Broderick's voice appears in voiceover. "Dear Mother," he begins, and the format for the film is quickly established. But we soon forget about even that artifice once the narrative grabs hold and won't let go.

Partly to placate the famed African American statesman Frederick Douglass (Raymond St. Jacques), the Union leaders decided to create an all-black 54th Regiment of Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry. Some were educated northerners who were born free, while others were runaway slaves or illiterate slaves recently freed. Listening to them talk--their world view, their experiences--is fascinating enough. But then you get layers of humanity and motivation and mischief that add even more texture to this wonderful film, which somehow manages to combine action and character studies into a fine historical narrative.

The prevailing thought, despite Douglass's living proof to the contrary, was that Blacks were not as educable as whites, and that they weren't trainable as soldiers. It was Col. Shaw's goal, especially as a humanist, to prove otherwise at a time when doctors didn't believe in anesthesia--even when amputating a soldier's leg. And it doesn't take Shaw long to write from Readville Camp, Massachusetts, "The men learn very quickly." Interestingly enough, even an avowed abolitionist can't hide the surprise that mixes with pride, and this story is just as much about the growth of the young colonel as it is about the transformation of the young men into a fighting unit that would ultimately be responsible for close to 200,000 more blacks enlisting, a phenomenon that Lincoln believed made the difference in the war.

There are strains of Stephen Crane's The Red Badge of Courage, too. Though there isn't the same kind of pre-battle talk and worry over how the soldiers will perform under fire, Col. Shaw himself has the same kind of reaction as Crane's young protagonist, whose first response is less than heroic. In his first battle, Shaw is felled and, disoriented and afraid, lies on the ground rather than getting up to continue fighting. It takes a soldier kicking him to find out if he was still alive before he finally gets up. The man who kicked him is a gravedigger (Morgan Freeman as John Rawlins) who will become one of Shaw's most trusted soldiers. Other characters have equally interesting arcs. Pvt. Trip (Denzel Washington) is a bitter, jaded escaped slave who signs up to fight, even though he doesn't think it will do a lot of good. His journey is from outsider and rebel to comradeship and a sense of purpose and belief. And Cpl. Thomas Searles (Andre Braugher), the bespectacled black man who grew up as a friend of the Shaw family and went to college, goes from timid "house nigger" to acceptance by the less educated men. Individually, their stories draw you in; collectively, they make for one fine film.

The men train, the men bond, the men endure the taunts of white regiments who say the Army will never let a "colored" regiment fight-that it's all a big joke-and finally their leader fights for them to get the chance to prove themselves. Thrown into the mix is the fact that the Confederacy issued a proclamation that any black man serving in the Union Army who was captured would be put to death, the inequity in pay that gave white soldiers $13 a month but blacks only $10, and a supply sergeant who gleefully refuses to give the men proper shoes because white regiments need them more, and you have plenty of social issues to add to the already complex layers of personal ones that the characters bring to the table. Or rather, I should say, screenwriter Kevin Jarre, who based his script on the Shaw letters and two books, Lay This Laurel by Lincoln Kirstein, and One Gallant Rush by Peter Burchard. It's solid entertainment--and education--every bloody step of the way, and everyone connected with the film does a fine job, from the cameramen to the stars. "Glory" won three Oscars and was nominated for two more. Washington earned a Best Supporting Actor statue, Freddie Francis got one for Best Cinematography, and Donald O. Mitchell, Gregg Rudloff, Elliot Tyson, and Russell Williams II received one for Best Sound. Art and Set Decoration and Editing were the unsuccessful nominees, but they're solid as well.