The Raid is a Civil War movie that takes place in upstate New York, Canada, and Vermont. That’s one of the many surprising things about this Twentieth Century-Fox picture, a film that has rarely been heard of since the time of its release. Based on true events, The Raid is situated one thousand miles from the front and near enough to the war’s end to provide a false sense of security to the Vermont town in which the story unfolds. There are no villains in this piece; nothing is made convenient for us as to whom we should be rooting for. The main characters, Union and Confederate, are sympathetic and afforded multi-dimensional treatment as they face up to the ravages of war. The Raid builds to a climax that could hardly be termed commercial in that it finishes without a comfortably resolved ending; it raises questions but it doesn’t have the presumption to supply facile answers. Without letting romance or notions of victory seep into its final moments, The Raid uncompromisingly dramatizes this incendiary piece of our history.

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