Days of Glory: The Forgotten Heroes Of WWII

Rachid Bouchareb, a French Algerian filmmaker, tells the heartwrenching yet amazing story of WWII's forgotten soldiers, who were left scattered in the remains of the many damaged ruins of what belonged to that war.

This film was based off of the many colonized African soldiers who were recruited for the war, and were to ultimately give their lives for France. The movie focuses on 4 main characters, all from different parts of Algeria who are both Berber and Arab: Said, Yassir, Messaoud, and Abdelkader, who are faced with cruel and hateful torments, yet are still there to stand up for a country where the torment comes from: their "beloved" France. 

To put it bluntly: I loved the film. I watched it with the family, because they too, had an interest in what the movie was about. There were many things about my own culture that I learned because of it and it almost made me proud to be an Algerian, because I witnessed the heroic actions and behaviors of people from my own country and the cruel colonization they had to deal with. 

Onto the criticisms; as an Algerian with grandparents and great-grandparents who witnessed what the colonization was like, there were some historical faults with the movie. In it, it was almost as if the characters were excited to fight for the motherland, that they were about to experience a new adventure and make new experiences. In reality, this was not the case. Many Algerians were resentful and did not want to participate in the war, however were forced to because, well, that's colonization. Other than that, I believe it was quite historically accurate and gave a good representation on what it was like to be an African soldier fighting for a war that didn't benefit them, and the blunt differences between the actual French soldiers and Arab soldiers and how they were treated. 

I won't spoil too much for you, but at the end of the film, it took a lot to hold back tears. It was a very emotional experience and afterwards it gave you an account of what happened to these African soldiers after the war. Many were not given pensions for their participation in the war and trials to receive these pensions are to this day ongoing. 

To wrap it up, if you are interested in history and culture, I would definitely give this film a waitch. It was a pretty accurate representation of the life of a colonial soldier and taught me a lot about it. I would give it a solid 9/10.