A murder of a black sergeant on a post in Louisiana in the spring of 1944 threatens blow up into a racially charged situation. A natural assumption is that the Ku Klux Klan would have seen a black man with stripes signifying authority and considered him a target. There were in fact race riots during World War II a fact the War Department considers in assigning one of the few black officers in the army, Howard Rollins to go to the post and investigate.
The late sergeant played by Adolph Caesar is a controversial man who no one is neutral about. In fact as Rollins probes a few people tell different stories and contradict themselves, giving different views about what kind of a guy Caesar was in life.
The film was directed by Norman Jewison and A Soldier's Story doesn't have one bit of wasted film footage or one bad performance out of his ensemble cast. Jewison got an Academy Award for directing In The Heat Of The Night also about a murder in the deep south that a black homicide detective gets corralled into helping the investigation.
Actually there is one element of the plot that is exactly the same as In The Heat Of The Night. Sidney Poitier as Virgil Tibbs driven by his own attitudes and the way he's been treated in the town of Sparta, Mississippi originally pursues one line of investigation. Later on however he gets on track and finds the real culprit. The exact same thing happens in A Soldier's Story. Ironically enough Howard Rollins also got to play Virgil Tibbs in the television series adapted from In The Heat Of The Night.
Two favorites in the supporting cast are a young Denzel Washington as one of the platoon soldiers and Art Evans as an older guy in the platoon who's been a non-commissioned officer before and is craftily kissing up to the right people to get those stripes back. The whole platoon is a cross section of male black America circa 1944.
That in itself is what makes A Soldier's Story a great film. It's a murder mystery, a sociological study of racism external and internal, and a well acted drama that can be viewed many times with something new learned with every viewing.
The late sergeant played by Adolph Caesar is a controversial man who no one is neutral about. In fact as Rollins probes a few people tell different stories and contradict themselves, giving different views about what kind of a guy Caesar was in life.
The film was directed by Norman Jewison and A Soldier's Story doesn't have one bit of wasted film footage or one bad performance out of his ensemble cast. Jewison got an Academy Award for directing In The Heat Of The Night also about a murder in the deep south that a black homicide detective gets corralled into helping the investigation.
Actually there is one element of the plot that is exactly the same as In The Heat Of The Night. Sidney Poitier as Virgil Tibbs driven by his own attitudes and the way he's been treated in the town of Sparta, Mississippi originally pursues one line of investigation. Later on however he gets on track and finds the real culprit. The exact same thing happens in A Soldier's Story. Ironically enough Howard Rollins also got to play Virgil Tibbs in the television series adapted from In The Heat Of The Night.
Two favorites in the supporting cast are a young Denzel Washington as one of the platoon soldiers and Art Evans as an older guy in the platoon who's been a non-commissioned officer before and is craftily kissing up to the right people to get those stripes back. The whole platoon is a cross section of male black America circa 1944.
That in itself is what makes A Soldier's Story a great film. It's a murder mystery, a sociological study of racism external and internal, and a well acted drama that can be viewed many times with something new learned with every viewing.