Review: Invictus

After the success of his first sports movie, Million Dollar Baby, Clint Eastwood takes on the sport of rugby, but with a social consciousness slant. Based on the novel by John Carlin, Invictus tells the story of Nelson Mandela's ambitious plan to use South Africa's national rugby team, the Springboks, to help unite the country in the wake of apartheid. The Springboks had to defy the odds to be able to make it to the 1995 Rugby World Cup Championship, held in South Africa.

After the first democratically run election in 1994, South Africa was still divided racially in the financial and political sectors as well as the sports arena. Reminders in the colors and symbols of the white supremacist rule are despised, but President Mandela recognized the opportunity to unify both races of his recovering country through the universal language of sport. Mandela's decision to keep the Springbok name, jersey, and colors is not approved of by the sports association or his advisors, yet he stands his ground in an attempt to reconcile with the Afrikaners.

Nelson Mandela reportedly stated that he thought Morgan Freeman should portray him on the screen. In Invictus Freeman convincingly portrays Mandela as the understated survivor of decades of political imprisonment and newly elected president of South Africa. Matt Damon plays Francois Pienaar, an Afrikaner and the captain of South Africa’s rugby team, who helped unite the country by leading the underdogs to victory in the 1995 World Cup Championship match. Damon's dedication to training his body and speech for several months pays off, and his star power doesn't overwhelm the role. The rugby scenes are rather long, and anyone unfamiliar with the game will probably be wondering "Who's winning?"

The ability of the Springboks members to come together as a team and win against the odds serves as a powerful metaphor for the struggle South Africa has faced. Whether from the novel or not, I'm neither convinced nor comfortable with the way Invictus downplays and almost trivializes some of the meetings with international visitors who appear to be present to invest in South Africa. With such a tenuous hold on the government, the idea tha a head of state would brush aside major issues and critical meetings for rugby seems far-fetched.

This film does not contain enough substance to convince me that Mandela was the man of vision he is purported to be. Very little is seen of social change, or the bigger issues of HIV/AIDS, crime, and corruption. The climactic game montage seems a bit trite, reminiscent of the 1979 "Mean" Joe Green Coke commercial. Furthermore, I came nowhere near connecting to the social consciousness of this film like I did for The Killing Fields or Blood Diamond. There is more muscle on Matt Damon as Francois Pienaar than there is in Invictus, and not the amount of heart and soul one might expect from director Clint Eastwood.