Denzel Washington stars in "The Great Debaters."

Among all the other Oscar heavyweights opening late last year, from "There Will Be Blood" to "Sweeney Todd," "The Great Debaters" was sort of drowned out amid the Oscar mania.

That’s a shame, because it was one of the more powerful films of 2007. And now it’s available on DVD.

At the story’s center is professor Mel Tolson (Denzel Washington), the coach of the debate team at the underestimated Texas school of Wiley College. It’s initially through Tolson’s eyes that we see the story, coming to understand him not simply as a man wanting to win the competition, but as a man who sees through the power of words and debate the opportunity for a whole new generation of oppressed students to counteract the biased ways of the South with a victorious war of words and ideas.

When he’s not teaching class or running debate practice, shooting down his student’s arguments without remorse in the hopes of toughening them up, he’s organizing late-night secret meetings between sharecroppers, trying to help organize a union between black and white workers - meetings that are broken up by the local sheriff who spreads word among the community that Tolson is a communist. It’s clear from the outset that Tolson is no mere teacher. He’s an activist, seeing in the power of both words and the almighty dollar ways that he can teach his students, and his community, ways to cut through the color barrier. By winning the argument, and winning the battle with exploitive land owners, one can finally win respect.

Really, the movie is a 90-minute setup for the climactic debating showdown in Cambridge. Through all the team’s various, earlier debates, we see the way that Tolson leads his kids into battle, swinging away relentlessly, determined to prove through the sheer number of victories that they are deserving of recognition (only later do we realize he has been mass-mailing established white colleges, begging for the chance to take the stage as equals). When Harvard responds and invites his team to a formal, publicized event, he can barely contain himself.

But as Tolson becomes more politically active, and controversial in the community, the movie also hints at the way he will become a liability to the team and how he will have to stay behind as his students head north for their defining moment.

In a limited but powerful fashion, the story offers us glimpses of the pervasive racism surrounding Tolson’s academic bubble. But it’s enough to make us realize what’s at stake on that final stage - to immerse ourselves in the arguments being used on the Harvard stage, both for and against the issue of civil disobedience

Directed by Denzel Washington, it’s a moment that shines brightly, and comes through loud and clear. As Tolson’s students take the stage, and turn to words, we hear what they are saying far more clearly because we have seen what they must endure, what they must overcome.