DVD Review: Days of Glory

8/08/2007 Posted by Admin

Rachid Bouchareb's "Days of Glory" offers a timely twist on the World War II genre, which lately has enjoyed a significant boost by exploring new niches.

Bouchareb's film is no exception.

The movie follows a troop of indigenous North African soldiers who joined the French army in 1943 to fight for France. It was a country these soldiers had never seen, but which they nevertheless were willing to die for in spite of the fact that, as Muslims, they were treated as third-rate citizens by the French fighting alongside them.

As written by Olivier Lorelle, this Academy Award nominee for Best Foreign Language Film reaches back into the past to give these men their due.

The film focuses on Said (Jamal Debbouze), Messaoud (Raschdy Zem), Yassir (Samy Naceri) and Abdelkader (Sami Bouajila) as they leave Algeria to join the battle in spite of feeling shunned by a motherland that refuses to embrace them. The idea that these men are at once unwanted and needed by France is a notion the country reinforces in their dismissive treatment of them.

The discrimination they encounter is cruel, yet the men still take to the frontlines to fight. They do so out of honor, but also in an effort to tear down the borders between them and the French. They believe that proving themselves on the battlefield is the only place for change and equality to begin.

As good as the movie is, it isn't without its problems. It overlooks the fact that some North African soldiers broke ranks to fight alongside the Germans (mentioning this would have deepened the film), and its forced, maudlin ending is a cliché that should have been axed altogether. Still, given the fierce staging of the final battle scene and the film's excellent performances--Debbouze and Naceri are standouts, as is Bernard Blancan as their sergeant--the movie's power is undeniable.

In a time in which so many Muslims are misunderstood, feared and vilified because of the terrorist acts of a few, here is a movie that bends time to offer another view. "Days of Glory" won't win the Academy Award--that likely will go to "Pan's Labyrinth," another film set during World War II--but awards are fleeting. The film's lasting importance is twofold--it remembers these men as allies and, after its successful viewing at the Cannes Film Festival, it shamed France into restoring their pensions, which had been frozen since 1959 in the wake of decolonization.

Grade: B+