July Film Review 2007
Days Of Glory Indegines 2006
Jamel Debbouze, Samy Naceri, Sami Bouajila, Rachid Bouchareb
Director Rachid Bouchareb
A powerful portrayal of Second World War
politics and beliefs. The story shows the French response to the impending danger of Hitlers troops, with a
rousing recruitment drive held in the North African countries of
Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia.
The
film follows the lives of four
men who, like many others at the time, willingly joined the French
Army. To some the prospect of being paid was an important part, but
there was no doubt that the recruits intention was to help defeat the
fascist threat.
The film offers the stark contrast of their homelands, to that of the French
countryside, food, and way of life, but more importantly the attitude
toward North African people within the French army structure.
Predjudices are shown through the many inequalities metered out to them from second rate food
to inadiquate boots, lack of time off, and medical care, while mail was routinely lost.
These men subsiquently found themselves fighting for a country most had never visited. Now enlisted, novices to infantry fighting and army life, the only option was to
make a stand for their rights, whilst facing gruelling physical and
emotional tests, as they fought their way across Europe finding
allegience amongst themselves.
The film is strong in its core
concept and this has been made all the more poignant, with the subsequent change of pension
laws for North African Ex Service men by Jack Chirac after their pension rights had
been abandoned by successive governments since the war.
Honored at the
Cannes film festival.
One
scene shows the dilema these men
must have faced. Two of the men find themselves in a Church alone,
unfamiliar with the religious artefacts. One sees the collection box
and
starts to empty it, the other suggests it is maybe for the poor.
Understanding he puts it back, but then asks the other about the
terrible violence that was inflicted upon their families to colonise
their country, what did they (the French) call it, it
was called the suppression of the insurgents replies the other.
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