Zulu (1964)

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Great Men of Colonial History: The Movie

Strange to see Zulu in hyper-woke 2021, requiring as it does implicit acceptance that its stiff-upper-lip British garrison -- defending their outpost in the Zulu Kingdom, in modern-day South Africa -- are colonial heroes. Based on the real-life Battle of Rorke's Drift, the small force of 150 takes on several thousand Zulu warriors.

Within the required moral boundary, it's an exciting historical epic. The casting is good and almost 60 years on it's quite a thrill to see Michael Caine as a coiffed pretty-boy officer, his breakout role. Through a postcolonial lens perhaps the best that can be said is that the enemy is neither demonized nor trivialized, but shown as a credible, organized fighting force with its own traditions of honour.

- Sam - 2021-02-13 00:56:43