Invictus

What is the film Invictus (besides one directed by Clint Eastwood)?

a) A sports movie following the well worn path where an underdog team becomes unlikely champions through the magic of of determination and true grit.
b) a biography covering the portion of Nelson Mandela's life in the challenging period after becoming President of South Africa when a critical need to heal and unite the country was called for.
c) a based on true life allegory to the healing power of forgiveness and sport fan-dom
d) a challenge to academy voters to create three new special categories, personal trainer to Matt Damon, accent coach to the stars, and film with the most simultaneously subtle and in your face product placement for Coca Cola in history.
e) All of the above

While the answer is almost never (e) in real life Invictus is the exception that proves the rule, covering a lot of ground in a relatively short period of time. Morgan Freeman co-stars as Nelson Mandela alongside Matt Damon who plays Francois Pienaar the head of the national rugby team.  While Matt Damon delivers a very solid performance in reality Freeman is the star.  He inhabits the role naturally and has a significant monopoly on spoken dialog.  Damon certainly does believably transform himself into the captain of the national rugby team and gives us a direct example of how Mandela was able to influence the thinking of the white minority of South Africa through his strength of leadership.  Not to dwell on this part - but I do wonder how much time passed between the filming of 'The Informant!' and Invictus as the physical change in Damon is simply amazing.

The film is set in the early to mid nineties. Nelson Mandela has been freed from prison and elected President of South Africa.  He comes into office with a daunting set of challenges.  There are economic, crime, and health policy concerns just to name a few.  Perhaps spanning all issues is fear in the white minority about what the future holds and this fracture is making progress difficult.  Mandela hits upon a plan to encourage national
unity bringing everyone together supporting their national rugby team.  Unfortunately the team hasn't quite been thrilling anyone recently and they're viewed as longshots for the cup - not to mention being viewed as part of apartheid by the black majority.  He brings the same approach to building up the team that he demonstrates in building the country back up. Inspiration, forgiveness, and more inspiration. His shrewd political instincts seem to evolve into a genuine love for the game itself.  The team led by Francois rises to the occasion and together they move the team towards greatness and as a result help mend some of the country's mistrust.

The film is effective at what it sets out to do. In my view that means making an interesting movie that blends the underdog sporting cliches with an undeniably impressive man trying to drive a peaceful transition in a very damaged country.  It's hard to believe the rugby strategy wasn't but a small part of his actual focus - even so it comes across as a brilliant bit of leadership and keeps the focus well constrained making for a film sized story. The human touches, large to small (such as actually learning all the team member's names) Mandela used to gain trust and drive greatness are shown making it easier to understand/believe what might otherwise seem as a stretch of the imagination (made only stranger by it's truth).  The work itself isn't overly solemn and there's both cheering to be done and laughter mixed throughout.  Sure, it may gloss over what I suspect are human weaknesses of the folks involved to some extent - there are few true saints - though there's enough hinting at inner demons to keep it from being The Blind Side.  But for holiday season fare that encourages you to see the better side and potential of mankind you could do FAR worse. And I definitely walked away feeling as though I'd seen a different side of South African history than I had previously.  So entertainment, and learning - a good combination.

One minor quibble. The accents seem accurate to the uninformed (me).  At times it makes the discussions hard to follow. A subtitle here and there wouldn't hurt. If they could do it for Kisses and the Red Riding
Trilogy they could do it here. Home viewers will definitely benefit from closed captioning. It's not a major
complaint as the work to sound like the time and place beats it sounding like a bunch of American actors you
can easily follow.

If you're curious about the title - it's the name of a poem that's a favorite of Mandela he passes along to the Rugby captain. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invictus).

Screening notes: not doing much for the reputation of rugby players were the large number that seemed to be
let in en masse ahead of the folks waiting on line.  That may have been part of the organizers plan, but it made understanding ones chance of getting in judging simply by line length difficult.  Doing even less for the perception of math skills in the US was the fact that there didn't seem to be a count as to who was let into the theater.  It's one thing to be told the inn is full.  It's another to be in the theater with tons of folks milling around looking for a seat to be told, everyone without a seat needs to leave now.  Only to find more folks on line outside still waiting 15 minutes later. Not the best organized screening. Though thankfully a pretty well behaved group.  all things considered. Tip of the day: count 'em on the way in and compare to theater capacity.  Makes things much easier.