With Alamo Like Odds

Rating: 9/10 (16 April 2007)

Zulu is the filmed account of the Battle of Rorke's Drift during the war against the Zulu nation in the part of South Africa known as Natal. It's not an explanation of policy as to why the British were in Africa, just an account of 139 brave soldiers successfully holding off 4000 to 5000 Zulu warriors, the fiercest fighters in that part of Africa.
To put in American terms for the rest of us Yanks, the British army was facing the same kind of odds the Texans did at the Alamo. They also were not certain any kind of relief was coming because the day before, on January 21, 1879 the army had sustained a cataclysmic defeat against those same Zulus at Isandlwana. Out of 850 soldiers about 50 of them survived, in no shape to give aid to anybody. It was the British equivalent of The Little Big Horn which had taken place on the American frontier three years earlier.
But on January 22,23 of 1879 the best of that generation in the United Kingdom performed to the max for Queen and country. Stanley Baker and Michael Caine play the two lieutenants, the engineer and the shave-tail from Sandhurst who commanded the troops at Rorke's Drift.
Just a brief bit of research on the internet indicated to me that I saw a fairly accurate account of just what went on for those two days. Zulu combines what is sometimes impossible, good history with good entertainment.
If it's broadcast it's not to be missed.