Times Change, We Need to Change as Well

I tend to avoid bio-flicks. Why would I want to watch the Fresh Prince pretend to be Muhammad Ali when I can watch Ali as himself in When We Were Kings? The problem with most bio-flicks is they try to cram a whole life’s work into under two hours. When bio-flicks usually work is when they take a small segment of a person’s life, especially a little know, but important, aspect that an audience can learn about. That is such the case with the latest Clint Eastwood (Gran Torino) directed film, Invictus.

The film takes a look at the life of Nelson Mandela shortly after taking the office of president of South Africa and trying to unite the country after years of apartheid. His unlikely solution was to get the country behind its rugby team for the upcoming World Cup being held in the country after realizing all the white people in the stands were cheering for their Springboks while all the blacks were cheering against them as they came to represent apartheid. A story most of us Americans have never knew of because the sport is not big here and we were too busy following the O.J. Simpson murder case in 1995. Had this been a normal Mandela bio-flick, we would have gotten a large chunk of him during his nearly three decades spent in jail, and the rugby portion would most likely been boiled down to one scene if it even got mentioned at all.

In Invictus, Morgan Freeman (Million Dollar Baby) plays the newly elected president who reaches out the captain of the national rugby team played by Matt Damon (Good Will Hunting). I’m am sure some people could give grief to Damon’s accent in the film, but it really didn’t bother me as there are plenty of actors in the film that have natural South African accents that were hard to understand what they are saying at times.

Politics aside, Invictus makes for a pretty decent sports movie. Being about a sport that is so unfamiliar with American movie goers, it isn’t bogged down with sports clichés that you see over and over with to the point you expect them in overdone sports over here like baseball movies (though it still has some of the universal sports clichés that populate most sports movies). There are some amazing camera shots like a ground view shot of a scrum and a game that was played in monsoon type rain. And of course when the Springboks plays the All-Blacks of New Zealand we get treated to the Haka which makes you wonder why this hasn’t been imported into other team sports. Maybe if LeBron had done the Haka before games instead of clowning around with silly bowling skits or his cheesy WWE-style chalk throw, maybe he would still be playing.

For the special features on the blu-ray (in stores now as a combo pack and also separately available in DVD, On Demand and digital download forms) you get an in-depth picture-in-picture commentary with insight from the cast, crew and Clint himself. Two behind the scenes featurettes, a standard making of which includes Freeman and Damon meeting their real life counterparts and a separate one about turning the Hollywood star into a rugby play, along with the Invictus music trailer as well as access to BD Live. There is also a twenty minute excerpt from The Eastwood Factor which will be available June 1 individually or part of the blu-ray box set Clint Eastwood Collection which features 10 of his classics.

Invictus gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.



Full Disclosure Notice: This Blu-Ray was given to me on behalf of Warner Brothers Entertainment for the purpose of reviewing the movie.