A repulsively condescending exploitation film

Rating: 4/10 (10 September 2009)

When I finished watching this film I honestly felt sick. It is one of the most patronising and formulaic films that I've seen in a long time that serves the viewer nothing but overblown sentimentality and self-righteousness.
Race is an extremely important issue that deserves to be treated with respect. This film merely seeks to exploit the highly emotionally charged issues in a pathetic attempt to try and bring hollow tears to the faces of its viewers.
Everything in this film is done by the book. All the stereotypical characters are there, lined up and ready to be used in the most cliché of fashion. The film doesn't even try and tell a story but instead stick a load of over the top scenes together, accompanied by an extremely annoying pretentious score, that try to create many climactic "moments" to try and move the viewer.
Another thing that really annoyed me about this film is the title itself, "Glory". What is really glorious about a load of men getting killed, black or white? The film doesn't even try to portray the foolishness of war and instead resorts to partiotically flag-waving, proud that America was founded on such bloodshed. Mel Gibson in a kilt screaming "FREEDOM" at the top of his lungs would not seem out of place.
However, when you spray as many emotional scenes about the place at least a couple are going to hit their targets. The scene where Matthew Broderick is shouting at the stuttering squirrel shooter and fireing his pistol did manage to get a response out of me. This is because it was one of the few scenes that decided to leave race alone and attempt to deal with the reality of war. Another couple of scenes were well done too, but these scenes' resonance was muted by the overall quality of the others.
The battle scenes were well done, in a sense that they looked realistic. I thought that these might be able to help save the film but, to my dismay, as soon as I'm starting to believe in them another highly telegraphed clichéd plot point comes along that completely breaks up the intensity and disintegrates into farce.
There isn't really a lot more than I can say about the film. I can't really comment on the quality of the acting because the actors were forced to play such one dimensional characters. I had been recommended this movie by a couple of people and had really high hopes for it, but instead of being a glorious experience it was condesending and repulsive.