It's tempting to think that the English-speaking title of this film was chosen to appeal to the US market, although it can be read either as heavy with irony, or as high tragedy. The French title refers to the protagonists of the epic, the 'Indigenes', which is, apparently, a colloquial word for 'natives'. It gives nothing away to reveal that this is about the recruiting of thousands of Africans, Berbers and Arabs to fight for their colonial ruler against Germany, only to be treated as serfs during battle and actively forgotten afterwards, as it was only after seeing this film that President Chirac relented and finally allowed equal pension rights to the foreigners. And this, after all pensions had been frozen in 1959 as their respective countries ceased to be colonies, then reinstated, but only on paper. Many key scenes: the mutiny when blacks and Muslims are refused tomatoes in the ship canteen, the refusal to Africans of leave taken by white French troops, the company ordered to assemble in a town hall for the kind of entertainment that used to be mercilessly ridiculed in The Beano. The curtain draws back, two excessively snooty ballet dancers (tights and tutu) mime long-drawn-out anxiety, and the audience at first baffled then insulted, drift out. Central to the story are four men, little Said, who wants to get away from his mother; Yassir, an older and sardonic guy, who claims he's only in it for the money, but he is really looking out for his little brother Larbi; Messaoud, who is a born rebel; and the sergeant, Martinez, a really complex character who wishes desperately to be known as a white man but eventually has to stand up with his own people . Another important little scene is when Yassir reminisces about the French killing his country folk in the past, suggesting that it would be called 'pacification'. Messaoud falls in love with a French girl, but when she sends him a letter with photo, his reply, also with photo, is quietly buried by the censor for whom the spectacle of 'our women' being taken by 'them' is untenable; and her attempts to find out what happened to her lover are politely frustrated. In all, it's a complex and finely-crafted story, and everyone has hidden depths that are revealed through the action. The ensemble shared 'best actor' award at Cannes. The photography, (by Patrick Blossier) mostly with a hint of sepia, often in black-and-white, is, although quite beautiful, also quite convincing as a kind of reality whether it's mud, bullets and blood or a rejoicing liberated village, and added to that, and of course the direction, the use of sound in the battle scenes must make them the most convincing yet. Bouchareb says he had seen a lot of movies about the Second World War but never seeing any Muslim soldiers, and knowing some of his ancestors had died in the battlefields of World War 1 and his uncle fought in Indochina, he researched the subject and discovered it wasn't only a few soldiers from Africa and North Africa, but that most of the Free French army was made up of men from the colonies - from Algeria, Morocco, Senegal, Tunisia, Mali, Madagascar and Indochina."I realised then that this was an important subject for cinema." CLIFF HANLEY
Review of Days of Glory
