IMDb user comments for
'Breaker' Morant
Anti-war movie from the Boer War in South Africa., 3 December 1999
10/10
Author: Dale Sterling from Dallas, Texas
This superb film illustrates the costs of empire building. Three Australian soldiers in the Boer War wind up ahead of their time in declaring total war. Used as scapegoats and pawns to end the war and save face for the British and the Germans, they are court-martialed despite the ingenious defense by their lawyer. I never see this film without crying. The unfairness and callous attitude toward these brave men will long live in infamy. Before one goes to fight a war, one would do well to know the color of the enemy's uniform.
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This movie is about The Boer War, and particularly what happens when the British need a scapegoat for the killing of a German missionary and six Boer (Dutch) prisoners. A fascinating and multi-layered film.
To call this a simple anti-British film, like someone pointed out, is simplistic and false. It uses real actions of people in a situation where the outcome could have two different endings. Remember, the soldiers aren't entirely innocent. They have killed, but it is war.
This, and incidents like these, were the turning point for countries in the commonwealth. It is nice to see it dramatized but not manipulative.
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http://imdb.com/title/tt0080310/usercomments?start=40See also:
Breaker Morant
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Harry 'Breaker' Harbord Morant
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Harry 'Breaker' Harbord Morant
For the film of the same name, see 'Breaker' Morant (film)
Harry 'Breaker' Harbord Morant (1864- 27 February 1902) was an Anglo-Australian drover, horseman, poet and soldier whose renowned skill with horses earned him the nickname "The Breaker." Articulate, intelligent and well educated, he was also a published poet and became one of the better-known "back-block bards" of the 1890s, with the bulk of his work appearing in The Bulletin magazine.
During his service in the Second Boer War, Morant ordered the summary execution of several Afrikaner and African prisoners, which led to his controversial court-martial and execution for murder by the British Army; his death warrant was personally signed by the British commander in South Africa, Lord Kitchener.
In the century since his death Morant has become a folk hero in Australia. His story has been the subject of several books and a major Australian feature film. Even during his lifetime there was a great deal of conflicting information about this romantic but elusive figure, and many of the stories about him are undoubtedly apocryphal.
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Like so much of his story, the exact sequence and nature of the events leading up to Morant's arrest and trial are still hotly disputed and accounts vary considerably. While it seems clear that some members of the BVC were responsible for shooting Boer prisoners and others, the precise circumstances of these killings and the identities of those responsible will probably never be known for certain. The following account is drawn mainly from the only surviving eyewitness source, the 1907 book "Scapegoats Of The Empire" by Lt George Witton, one of the three Australians sentenced to death for the alleged murders and the only one to escape execution.
With Hunt now commanding the detachment at Fort Edwards, discipline was immediately re-imposed by Lts Morant and Handcock, but this was resisted by some. In one incident, several members of a supply convoy led by Lt Picton looted the rum it was carrying, so they were arrested for insubordination and for threatening to shoot Picton. They escaped to Pietersburg but Capt. Hunt sent a report to Col. Lenehan, who had them detained. When the matter was brought before Col. Hall, the commandant of Pietersburg, he ordered the offenders to be discharged from the regiment and released. Witton explicitly accuses these disaffected troopers of being responsible for "the monstrous and extravagant reports about the BVC which appeared later in the English and colonial press."
Back at Fort Edward, the seized livestock was collected and handed over to the proper authorities and the stills were broken up, but according to Witton these actions were resented by the perpetrators and as a result Morant and Handcock were "detested" by certain members of the detachment.
Witton arrived at Fort Edwards on August 3 with Sgt Major Hammett and thirty men, and it was at this point that he met Morant and Handcock for the first time.
More:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breaker_Morant
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