A Soldier’s Story

When a black soldier is found shot in a suspected racist killing in a southern U.S. Army base, military lawyer Denzel Washington is sent to uncover the truth., Adaptation of Charles Fuller’s Pulitzer Prize-winning play about racial tension in a segregated World War II army base., A drama set during World War II, in which a black military attorney investigates the death of a black sergeant. The lawyer eventually discovers that the sergeant was both ashamed of his own culture and virulently hated by his men., Inspired by the Herman Melville novel Billy Budd, writer Charles Fuller created the Pulitzer Prize-winning A Soldier’s Play, which he then adapted into this film drama in 1984, for socially conscious, liberal director Norman Jewison. In the racially-divided 1940s, Fort Neal, Louisiana, is a military base where black soldiers are sent not to fight in WWII but to play baseball against other armed forces teams. The murder of a black sergeant, Waters (Adolph Caesar) brings an investigator, Captain Davenport (Howard E. Rollins, Jr.) to the base. Davenport, the first black officer that most of the men have ever met, suspects that a pair of white men were responsible for Waters’ death, but his probe reveals that nearly everyone, regardless of skin color, had ample reason to kill the loathsome but pitiable Waters. The cast of A Soldier’s Story features early supporting performances from several African-American actors who would go on to greater prominence, including Denzel Washington, David Alan Grier, and Robert Townsend. The film was nominated for three Oscars: Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor (Caesar) and Best Adapted Screenplay., A black soldier is murdered on a racially divided military base in 1940s Louisiana. An officer is brought in to investigate and discovers that anyone on the base, regardless of skin color, had a reasonable motive to kill the detestable soldier.