Building on the qualities of his earlier films, Lee here tackles a far grander subject—the American Civil War. About a unit of young ‘Bushwackers’— Southern guerrillas taking on Yankee platoons—it focuses on the experiences of two friends: plantation owner’s son Jack Bull (Skeet Ulrich) and Jake (Tobey Maguire), both basically liberal on the issue of slavery but driven by vengeance and proud loyalty to bear arms for the Confederacy.
Steadily, however, the pair find themselves becoming rebels without a cause. Truly epic in scale yet full of beautifully observed details, the film benefits from sturdy yet exquisite performances and yet another intelligent and incisive James Schamus script. The social and ethical issues are treated with depth, but there’s no sermonising: the light touch extends to a gentle humour interspersed amid the carnage.