RUGBY HAS A WORLD CUP?

Invictus

**1/2

Review by Paul Preston

Can Clint Eastwood make a movie any more without getting an Oscar nomination of some kind? In “Invictus”, Morgan Freeman was nominated for playing Nelson Mandela and Matt Damon was nominated for playing Francois Pienaar, captain of the South African rugby team. If you had to nominate anything in “Invictus”, Freeman and Damon are the movie’s best assets in an otherwise routine sports movie.

It’s interesting that “Invictus” is the Nelson Mandela movie that got made. For a decade or so now, it’s been rumored that Freeman should play Mandela. And given Mandela’s prison sentence and his rise to lead the country that imprisoned him, there had to be scripts out there that reflected Mandela’s story as a great epic movie. Yet, this Mandela story is about his first year in office, and one of his goals to unite a country still in the shadow of apartheid – winning the Rugby World Cup.

The challenges are abundant. The people are conflicted, even Mandela’s security force is compromised of black and white men who have trouble working together. Mandela’s personal appearances don’t always lead to cheers from the crowd, and rugby is a mostly white man’s sport, with mostly white players and Mandela wants to rally the country behind them. Mandela won’t even change the long-standing name of the rugby team, The Springboks, which Mandela himself once called the team of ‘white South Africa’, because he wants to integrate ideals without disregarding the country’s history, and make The Springboks the team of ALL South Africa. I have to admit I’m reminded of Obama’s desire to ‘reach across the aisle’, and Barack could use a little bit of Mandela’s resolve.

Another big challenge is the underdog South African team taking on the dominant New Zealand team, who in playoff games, had crushed their opponents by a high double-digit margin every game. In order to motivate and train the team to compete, Mandela enlists the support of Afrikaner Pienaar. Their relationship is smartly drawn, one of respect.

It’s a prestigious picture, with a prestigious director. The scenes have weight and deal with a lofty, adult subject. So what doesn’t work? First of all, Eastwood is known for making long, languid movies that take their time . He doesn’t quite jive with the sports picture. And I know “Invictus” is about more than sports, but the second half of the film deals mainly with “the big game”, and the movie doesn’t have the same fire in its belly as, say, “Rocky” or “Hoosiers”.

Plus, I suppose it’s admitting being uninformed to ask for a clearer explanation of the rules of rubgy from “Invictus”, but I could’ve used it. A movie like “The Color of Money” made billiards clear and “Tin Cup” made golf a little more palatable for all audiences. During “Invictus”, every time I thought I knew what was happening in the rugby games, I was off. The weirdest thing about not taking time to explain the rules of rugby to the non-rugby-initiated is that there was an opportunity. One character (one of Mandela’s security agents) wasn’t much of a rugby fan, and the opportunity for us to learn all about the game while he did was passed over. I’m sure they didn’t want to use a goofy cinematic device to learn us the ways of rugby. But I needed it!

Lastly, here’s something that I never thought would infect an Eastwood movie – BAD CGI! The final game is LOADED with green screen and computer-generated crowds. There are plenty of shots of crowds, but whenever there was a shot of a full stadium, it was computer-generated. Pretty lame. I know Clint’s used computer effects before (“Flags of Our Fathers”, for example), so he’s not entirely foreign to them, but there are so many shots of big, fake crowds in this movie it TOOK ME OUT.

And with the predictability of a benign sports movie at the controls, it was tough to get back in.

Directed by: Clint Eastwood
Release Date: December 11, 2009
Run Time: 133 Minutes
Country: USA
Rated: PG-13
Distributor: Warner Bros. Pictures

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