Damn Yankees Ashore, Johnny Reb Asea

Saturday, July 12, 4:45pm, at the usual place

FIRST FEATURE:
“Glory" (1989, 122 min.) Directed by Edward Zwick; screenplay by Kevin Jarre, based on Lay This Laurel by Lincoln Kirstein, One Gallant Rush by Peter Burchard, and the letters of Col. Robert Gould Shaw; starring Matthew Broderick, Denzel Washington, Cary Elwes, Morgan Freeman, Jihmi Kennedy, Andre Braugher.

The Amazon.com editorial review:
One of the very best films about the Civil War, this instant classic from 1989 is also one of the few films to depict the participation of black soldiers in Civil War combat. Based in part on the books Lay This Laurel by Lincoln Kirstein and One Gallant Rush by Peter Burchard, the film also draws from the letters of Robert Gould Shaw (played by Matthew Broderick), the 25-year-old son of Boston abolitionists who volunteered to command the all-black 54th Regiment of the Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry. Their training and battle experience leads them to their final assault on Fort Wagner in South Carolina, where their heroic bravery turned bitter defeat into a symbolic victory that brought recognition to black soldiers and turned the tide of the war. With painstaking attention to historical detail and richness of character, the film boasts superior performances by Denzel Washington (who won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor), Morgan Freeman, Cary Elwes, and Andre Braugher. Directed by Edward Zwick (cocreator of the TV series Thirtysomething), this unforgettable drama is as important as Schindler's List in its treatment of a noble yet little-known episode of history. --Jeff Shannon


DINNER BREAK:
Food theme: Seafood & Soul food

SECOND FEATURE:
"The Hunley" (1999, 94 min.) Directed by John Gray; written by John Gray & John Fasano; starring Armand Assante, Donald Sutherland, Alex Jennings, Chris Bauer, Gerry Becker, Michael Dolan, Sebastian Roché, Michael Stuhlbarg.

This historical drama won an Emmy for Sound Editing.

The Amazon.com editorial review:
Produced for Turner Network Television and originally broadcast in the summer of 1999, The Hunley is a straightforward, engrossing historical drama focusing on a little-known chapter of the Civil War: the introduction of the submarine into American naval warfare off the shore of war-torn Charleston, South Carolina, in 1864. Writer-director John Gray had previously helmed the 1998 TV movie The Day Lincoln Was Shot, and he has a knack for capturing the Civil War era with a heightened sense of authenticity, allowing for the dramatic license of mainstream television. Armand Assante plays Lieutenant Dixon, a traumatized soldier and grieving widower with just the right mixture of bravado and nihilism to skipper the C.S.S. Hunley--essentially an iron boiler cobbled into a hand-powered submersible weapon--with a volunteer crew of nine men who propel the crude sub in an effort to break the Union's coastal blockade. Donald Sutherland is superbly cast as Dixon's Confederate commander, General Beauregard, and the film's best scenes are those between Assante and Sutherland, playing two weary warriors with one final chance for victory. Otherwise, this is a very conventional film made with integrity but no particular flair, faithfully adhering to historical fact while establishing a solid supporting cast. Assante is guilty of moderate overacting, but he compensates with enough charisma to make his ill-fated command dramatically involving. Most effective is the sense of sheer bravery in the pioneering effort to prove the Hunley as a viable tool of war; the final scene within the sub is both haunting and dramatically intense. (Historical note: The C.S.S. Hunley--named after the drowned captain of a previous test vessel--was discovered intact off the coast of Charleston in 1995; efforts were later made to raise and restore this relic of naval history.) --Jeff Shannon


SHORT SUBJECTS:
We hope to show "Southern Fried Rabbit", with Bugs Bunny and Yosemite Sam. Other short subject TBA.

For info on the Laser Rangers, send an e-mail
with subject "Laser Rangers" to