Top Qs
Timeline
Chat
Perspective

Invictus (film)

2009 biographical sports drama film From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Invictus (film)
Remove ads

Invictus is a 2009 docudrama sports film directed by Clint Eastwood and starring Morgan Freeman and Matt Damon. It is the third collaboration between Eastwood and Freeman after Unforgiven (1992) and Million Dollar Baby (2004), and the first between Eastwood and Damon, followed by Hereafter (2010). The story is based on the 2008 John Carlin book Playing the Enemy: Nelson Mandela and the Game That Made a Nation about the events in South Africa before and during the 1995 Rugby World Cup. The national team, the Springboks, were not expected to perform well, the team having only recently returned to high-level international competition following the dismantling of apartheid—the country was hosting the World Cup, thus earning an automatic entry. Freeman portrays South African President Nelson Mandela while Damon played Francois Pienaar, the captain of the Springboks, the South Africa rugby union team.[6]

Quick facts Directed by, Screenplay by ...

Invictus was released in the United States on 11 December 2009. The film is named after a poem of the same name by British poet William Ernest Henley, which serves as a central plot element in the film. The film was met with positive critical reviews and earned Academy Award nominations for Freeman (Best Actor) and Damon (Best Supporting Actor). The film grossed $122.2 million on a budget of $50–60 million.[4]

Remove ads

Plot

Summarize
Perspective

On 11 February 1990, Nelson Mandela is released from Victor Verster Prison after having spent 27 years in captivity.[7] Four years later, Mandela is elected the first black President of South Africa. His presidency faces enormous challenges in the post-Apartheid era, including rampant poverty and crime, and Mandela is particularly concerned about racial divisions between black and white South Africans, which would lead to violence. The ill will which both groups hold towards each other is seen even in his own security detail where relations between the established white officers, who had guarded Mandela's predecessors, and the black ANC additions to the security detail, are frosty and marked by mutual distrust.

While attending a rugby union match between South Africa and England, Mandela notices that some black South Africans are supporting England rather than the mostly-white Springboks due to the legacy of apartheid; he remarks that he did the same while imprisoned on Robben Island. Knowing that South Africa is set to host the 1995 Rugby World Cup in one year's time, Mandela persuades a meeting of the newly black-dominated South African Sports Committee to support the Springboks. He then meets with the captain of the Springboks, Francois Pienaar, and implies that a victory for South Africa in the World Cup will unite and inspire the nation. Mandela also recites to Pienaar William Ernest Henley's poem "Invictus" that inspired him during his time in prison.

Pienaar and his teammates train. Many South Africans, both black and white, doubt that rugby will unite a nation torn apart by nearly fifty years of apartheid, especially considering the image of the Springboks to many in the black community. Both Mandela and Pienaar, however, stand firm in their belief that the game can successfully unite South Africans. Things begin to change as the players interact with the majority black fans and begin a friendship with them, hosting coaching clinics across the country at the specific request of Mandela. During the opening games, support for the Springboks begins to grow among the black population. By the second game, the whole country comes together to support the Springboks and Mandela's efforts. Mandela's security team also grows closer as the racially diverse officers come to respect their comrades' professionalism and dedication, in addition to bonding over the game of rugby, a sport which previously appealed primarily to the white team members while being disdained by their black counterparts.

As Mandela watches, the Springboks defeat their arch-rival and the defending champions Australia in their opening match. They then continue to defy all expectations and, as Mandela conducts trade negotiations in Taiwan, defeat France in heavy rain to advance to the final against their other rival New Zealand. New Zealand and South Africa were universally regarded as the two greatest rugby nations, with South Africa then the only side to have a winning record against New Zealand since their first meeting in 1921. Meanwhile, one day during the tournament, the Springboks visit Robben Island, where Mandela spent the first eighteen of his twenty-seven years in prison. There, Pienaar is inspired by Mandela's will and his idea of self-mastery in "Invictus". Pienaar mentions his amazement that Mandela "could spend thirty years in a tiny cell and come out ready to forgive the people who put him there".

Supported by a large home crowd of all races at Ellis Park Stadium in Johannesburg, Pienaar motivates his teammates for the final. Mandela's security detail receives a scare when, just before the match, a South African Airways Boeing 747-200 jetliner flies in low over the stadium. However, it is not an assassination attempt, but a demonstration of patriotism with the message "Good Luck, Bokke" painted on the undersides of the plane's wings. Mandela also arrives onto the field before the match wearing a Springbok cap and a replica of Pienaar's #6 jersey. The Springboks complete their run by beating New Zealand 15–12 in extra time, thanks to a drop goal from fly-half Joel Stransky, to become the world champion. Mandela and Pienaar meet on the field together to celebrate the victory, and Mandela hands Pienaar the Webb Ellis Cup. Mandela's car then drives away in the traffic-jammed streets leaving the stadium. He insists that there is no hurry as his security team wanted to change the route due to the cheering crowd. As Mandela watches South Africans celebrating together in the street from his car, his voice is heard reciting "Invictus" again.

Remove ads

Cast

Remove ads

Production

Summarize
Perspective

The film is based on the book Playing the Enemy: Mandela and the Game that Made a Nation by John Carlin.[9] The filmmakers met with Carlin for a week in his Barcelona home, discussing how to transform the book into a screenplay.[10] Filming began in March 2009 in Cape Town. Primary filming in South Africa was completed in May 2009.[10]

Morgan Freeman was the first actor to be cast, as Mandela. Matt Damon was then cast as team captain Francois Pienaar, despite being significantly smaller than him[11] and much smaller than members of the current Springbok squad.[12] He was given intensive coaching by Chester Williams, another star of the 1995 team, at the Gardens Rugby League Club.[13] "In terms of stature and stars, this certainly is one of the biggest films ever to be made in South Africa", said Laurence Mitchell, the head of the Cape Film Commission.[14] On 18 March 2009, Scott Eastwood was cast as flyhalf Joel Stransky (whose drop goal provided the Springboks' winning margin in the 1995 final).[15] Over Christmas 2008, auditions had taken place in London to try to find a well-known British actor to play Pienaar's father, but in March it was decided to cast a lesser-known South African actor instead.[16] Zak Fe'aunati, who had previously played professionally for Bath, was cast as Jonah Lomu,[17] while Grant L. Roberts was cast as Ruben Kruger, who was the Springboks' other starting flanker in 1995. Chester Williams was also involved with the project to teach rugby to those of the cast playing players who had not played it before, while Freeman and Williams also became involved with the ESPN 30 For 30 film The 16th Man. Filming of the final also took place on location at Ellis Park Stadium, the actual venue for the 1995 final.

Release

Invictus opened in 2,125 theaters in North America at #3 with US$8,611,147 and was the largest opening for a rugby-themed film. The film held well and ultimately earned $37,491,364 domestically and $84,742,607 internationally for a total of $122,233,971, above its $60 million budget.[4]

Home media

The film was released on 18 May 2010 on DVD and Blu-ray Disc. Special features include

  • Matt Damon Plays Rugby
  • Invictus music trailer

The Blu-ray release included a digital copy and additional special features:

  • Vision, Courage and Honor: Diplo and the Power of a True Story
  • Mandela Meets Morgan
  • The SmoothieWolf Factor documentary excerpts
  • Picture-in-Picture exploration with cast, crew and the real people who lived this true story
Remove ads

Reception

Summarize
Perspective

The film was met with generally positive reviews. Review aggregate Rotten Tomatoes reports that 77% of critics have given the film a positive review based on 241 reviews, with an average score of 6.60/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "Delivered with typically stately precision from director Clint Eastwood, Invictus may not be rousing enough for some viewers, but Matt Damon and Morgan Freeman inhabit their real-life characters with admirable conviction".[18] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 74 out of 100, based on 34 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews.[19]

Critic David Ansen wrote:[20]

Anthony Peckham's sturdy, functional screenplay, based on John Carlin's book Playing the Enemy, can be a bit on the nose (and the message songs Eastwood adds are overkill). Yet the lapses fade in the face of such a soul-stirring story—one that would be hard to believe if it were fiction. The wonder of Invictus is that it actually went down this way.

Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film three-and-a-half stars[21] and wrote:

It is a very good film. It has moments evoking great emotion, as when the black and white members of the presidential security detail (hard-line ANC activists and Afrikaner cops) agree with excruciating difficulty to serve together. And when Damon's character—François Pienaar, as the team captain—is shown the cell where Mandela was held for those long years on Robben Island. My wife, Chaz, and I were taken to the island early one morning by Ahmed Kathrada, one of Mandela's fellow prisoners, and yes, the movie shows his very cell, with the thin blankets on the floor. You regard that cell and you think, here a great man waited in faith for his rendezvous with history.

Shave Magazine's Jake Tomlinson wrote:[22]

Eastwood's film shows how sport can unify people, a straightforward and moving message that leaves audiences cheering. The sports, accurate portrayal and the solid storyline earn this movie a manliness rating of 3/5. However, the entertainment value, historical accuracy and strong message this movie delivers earn it an overall rating of 4.5 stars. Definitely, worth seeing.

Variety's Todd McCarthy wrote:[23]

Inspirational on the face of it, Clint Eastwood's film has a predictable trajectory, but every scene brims with surprising details that accumulate into a rich fabric of history, cultural impressions and emotion.

Awards and honors

More information Organization, Award ...
  1. [N 1]
    tied with The Stoning of Soraya M.
  2. [N 2]
    tied with George Clooney for Up In The Air
Remove ads

Soundtrack

Main article: Invictus (soundtrack)

Kyle Eastwood and Michael Stevens composed the score, after previously doing the same for Clint's Letters from Iwo Jima (2006) and Gran Torino (2008).[37] The soundtrack was released under the New Line Records label on December 1, 2009, featuring 18 songs that accompanied Eastwood and Stevens' score, and songs performed by the South African a cappella group Overtone led by Yorlandi Nortjie.[37]

Remove ads

See also

References

External links

Loading related searches...

Wikiwand - on

Seamless Wikipedia browsing. On steroids.

Remove ads
Remove ads