Invictus (2009)
Directed by Clint
Eastwood
Warner Brothers, 133
minutes, PG-13
In English,
Afrikaans, Xhosa, Zulu, Maori
★★★½
I got psyched for the women's World Cup soccer final by
watching a film about rugby. Huh? Not the same, I know, but I watched Invictus, which I had never seen, partly
because of the controversy stirred up by conservatives because of Megan
Rapinoe's strident anti-Trump remarks. I notice that the right never goes into
a tizzy when one of its own such as Tom Brady, Dale Earnhardt Jr., John Rocker,
Curt Schilling, or Tim Tebow spout their views, but never mind. Let me address
something that Invictus does well. It
puts to rest the naïve belief that sports should be politics-free. They never
have been. Take a look at
controversy and tragedy at the Olympic games in 1932, 1968, 1972, 1980, and
1984. Even in a good year, the Olympics does a better job at flaming
nationalism than of celebrating athletic excellence.
Soccer and rugby long ago gave up the pretense that sports exist
independent of politics. Director
Clint Eastwood takes us to the 1995 Rugby World Cup, which was held in South
Africa less than 5 years after Nelson Mandela (Morgan Freeman) was released
from his apartheid jail cell after 27 years, and just one after he was elected
South Africa's first black president. His nation's rugby team, the Springboks, was
a source of pride for whites, but Mandela noticed that the black majority
rooted for whomever was playing the Springboks. To their eyes, the very name and
color of the jersey represented decades of apartheid. Mandela, though, resisted
calls for a new name and jersey, as he knew his job was to represent all South Africans, plus he needed to
attract foreign investment for South Africa's fragile democracy. The last thing
he needed was a flight of white money with the World Cup coming to Johannesburg.
His task was to make the Springboks a symbol of national pride. The problem, though, was simple: the Springboks
sucked! So how to meld a team and get everyone to root for it, especially when
the squad had but one black player, Chester Williams (McNeil Hendriks)?
Mandela decided that the racial healing began with team
captain François Pienaar (Matt Damon), who was sired in a racist Afrikaner*
home. In not-entirely-accurate scenes Pienaar buys into the new South Africa,
comes to admire Mandela's struggle, and whips the squad into shape. Pienaar's
transformation was capped by a visit to Robbens Island where Mandela was jailed for nearly three
decades, and the Springboks–at Mandela's suggestion–began to capture black
support by conducting clinics in the townships to which they were confined and
still concentrated.
You can look it up, so no need to worry about spoilers. In
the 1995 tournament, South Africa shockingly defeated heavily favored Australia
and eventually won the Cup by upsetting the New Zealand All Blacks in the
final. This was especially shocking given that the All Blacks featured Jonah Lomu, an explosive giant (6'5", 276 pounds) and the most dominating athlete
of my lifetime (with the possible exception of Secretariat!).
I liked the film, though I certainly recognize its
limitations. In feel it's a bit like Chariots
of Fire, which is to say that drama and over-the-top melodrama occupy
adjacent stadium seats. Invictus had
generally good reviews when it debuted a decade ago, with a few naysayers finding
it too "manly" in a thudding, muddy, spit-blood kind of way. Rugby is
a much tougher sport than gridiron football–no padding-–but it's not quite as
bone crunching as viewed on the screen. You might also wonder why we see Damon
bruised and sliced during a game, but looking spit-polish fine the next day.
(Did he bathe in Arnica to get rid of his bruises?) You could also be
(rightfully) skeptical as to whether Mandela spent his entire first year in
office fixating on the Springboks. In sum, this is a rather typical sports film–insert
any sport here–with an arc of demoralization followed by team bonding, hard
work, and glorious triumph. You could even call this an Eastwood family vanity
pic; Scott Eastwood played one of the Springboks and his brother Kyle composed
and/or co-arranged the music.
Nonetheless, it's a highly entertaining movie even though
ten years later we know that much of the South African dream died when Mandela
passed in 2013. Do I even need to tell you that Morgan Freeman was superb as
Mandela? He was nominated for a Best Actor Oscar, though he didn't win. The
surprise is how good Damon was; for a dude from Boston, he sports an excellent
Afrikaans accent. His acting is subtle, not a histrionic Hollywood star turn.
Kudos to both Eastwood and Damon for making us see the latter as a rugby
player, not a celebrity hunk.
If you're wondering about the film's title, it is that of a
poem by William Earnest Henley (1849-1903) that Mandela often recited in
confinement. [Follow the links for further details.] The movie is based on a
book written by John Carlin, who writes about the connections between–what
else?–sports and politics.
Rob Weir
*Afrikaner references the 17th century white
Dutch who colonized South Africa. The English took over "Cape" colony
in the 19th century. Afrikaners fled to the interior, formed the
Orange Free State, and eventually melded with French, Germans, and Swedes, all
of whom spoke a variant of Dutch called Afrikaans. The Union of South Africa
was formed in 1910 and absorbed the Orange Free State, which precipitated the
Boer Wars–Boer a word for Dutch farmers–that ended in defeat of the Boers.
They, however, came to dominate the Union and, in 1948, put apartheid into
place, a system akin to segregation in the US but much more brutal.
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