Invictus

Written at the time of the film's release...

"No One Plays 100%"

Rugby for the sake of rugby does not a movie make. John Huston's Victory, a soccer film about soccer, is a listless affair even with a cast that features Michael Caine, Sylvester Stallone and Pelé. But Clint Eastwood's Invictus,* about Nelson Mandela's uniting of an apartheid-torn South Africa though a burst of sports-fever, manages to tell a deeper story through the guise of a sports-film. It's a ruse that's perpetuated throughout the film as incident after incident of potential assassination or terrorism is exposed as something else; the fragile coalitions uniting the divided country are constantly in danger of exploding into violence, and the reminders are all around.

Reminders is exactly what Mandela is fighting against. His personal mandate is to keep the past in the past and move towards a united future. A former terrorist and prisoner, as president of a deposed Dutch government, he re-casts himself fresh to serve his country's interests, and finds the most difficult part of the job convincing others to do the same. By uniting former enemies under a common interest, the hope is the citizenry can at least start to look at each other without suspicion. 

Eastwood lays out the territory in his first elegant shot, panning from a neatly manicured grass-field filled with well-appointed white rugby players, up over a rigid fence to a city street and beyond it, to a ram-shackle wire fence holding back a vacant lot of towns-folk playing rugby as best they can. They have the one thing in common, but that's it. And that's the start.

A major criticism of the Eastwood style is a tendency to over-state the case, and that is in abundance in this film: through ham-fisted characters like a full-of-himself sports-announcer who provides story exposition in the most patronizing way; in the performance of Morgan Freeman, who, though stooped and halting, does not in any way project Mandela's fragility, making him more of a wax-work representation than a characterization; the occasional too-blunt dialogue.

The dialogue is where the movie fails; the direction is where the movie succeeds and surprises. One becomes more interested in the film's back-story of how Mandela's security detail—once on opposite sides of a political conflict—now must forge a bond to protect the president and each other (there is a situation in which they are clearly over their heads, and the empathy for them knows no boundary). The coming-together of the group stutters and evolves organically, far smoother than the soccer story.

But once, the soccer story kicks in—that's when things get very interesting. Field sports are tough to simulate and make authentic-looking (even The Damned United avoided it, for the most part, with archival footage), but Eastwood doesn't shy away from it, going in close, slowing the action down, amping up the stakes. The final game of the 1995 World Cup between South Africa's Springboks and the Māori-themed New Zealand All Blacks (there's some historical irony for you), where one should expect the film to start to drag, instead becomes a brutally intense struggle that more than serves as a metaphor for government struggling against itself and its own inertia to gain some ground in accomplishing some good. You can gripe all you want about stodginess and speechifying, but in subtle and surprising ways, Eastwood and crew bring you back to a thoughtful, invigorating re-appraisal of the themes through the action of the film, delivering a moving sub-text that elevates the film far beyond words. One goes into the film expecting one kind of film, and walks out amazed at how fulfilling, and skillfully presented, the film is.

* Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll.
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

William Ernest Henley (1849 - 1902)

Don't Make a Scene: Monty Python's Life of Brian

The Story: By rights, I should be presenting this entire scene from Monty Python's Life of Brian, but seeing how there are (in Python parlance) "naughty bits" of both the male and female kind, I'm eliminating the earlier section—that is a Rubicon I dare not cross.

Besides the really pithy part of the scene—the part I'm interested in—occurs later, so we don't have to go around stirring up trouble and causing the gendarme to get in a snit and cause a bother.

Besides, there may be children present and they could learn a thing or two.

 

As we said last week, we're looking at a specific theme over the next couple of weeks...we're not going to spell it out. You're just going to have to figure it out for yourselves (and none of this responding in unison business, thank you very much!)

   

The Set-Up: It is (significantly) 33 A.D. and Brian Cohen (Graham Chapman) of Nazareth grows up resenting the Roman occupation on Judea and joins the People's Front of Judea (PFJ) and in his attempts to prove himself, he winds up among a bunch of prophets and, to blend in, starts to spout plagiarized versions of the Sermon on the Mount (which he had witnessed and admired). Soon, he is being followed by increasing crowds and extolled as the Messiah, much to the consternation of his mother, Mandy (Terry Jones).

 

Action.

CROWD: Messiah! Messiah! 

CROWD: Messiah! Messiah! 

CROWD: Show us the Messiah! 

MANDY: Now, you listen here. 

MANDY: He's not the Messiah! He's a very naughty boy. 

MANDY: Now, go away! - 

CROWD (from now in unison): Who are you? - 

MANDY: I'm his mother, that's who.

CROWD: Behold his mother! Behold his mother! Hail to...

CROWD: ...thee, mother of Brian!

The crowd cheers, "Hosanna", "The Master" "All Hail" Etc. Pandemonium. A couple of Romans can be seen at the back of the crowd. We notice Reg and Judith at work in the crowd, they are keeping a wary eye on the Roman presence...whilst still trying to keep the Brian-worship going.

CROWD: Blessed art thou! Hosanna! All praise to thee, now and always! 

MANDY: Well, now don't think you can get around me like that. 

MANDY: He's not coming out, and that's my final word. - 

MANDY: Now, shove off! - 

CROWD: No! - 

MANDY: Did you hear what I said? - 

CROWD: Yes! 

MANDY: Oh, 

MANDY: I see. It's like that, is it? - 

CROWD: Yes! - 

MANDY: Oh, all right, then. You can see him for one minute, 

MANDY: but not one second more! - 

MANDY: Do you understand? - 

CROWD: Yes. - 

MANDY: Promise? - 

CROWD: Well... all right. 

MANDY: All right, here he is, then. 

MANDY: Come on, Brian. Come and talk. - 

BRIAN: But, Mum, Judith. - 

MANDY: Oh, leave that Welsh tart alone. 

BRIAN: I don't really want to. 

CROWD: Brian! 

CROWD: Brian! Brian! Brian! - 

BRIAN: Good morning. - 

CROWD: A blessing! A blessing! 

BRIAN: No, no. Please. Please, please listen. 

BRIAN: I've got one or two things to say. 

CROWD: Tell us! Tell us both of them! 

BRIAN: Look, you've got it all wrong. 

BRIAN: You don't need to follow me. 

BRIAN: You don't need to follow anybody. 

BRIAN: You've got to think for yourselves. 

BRIAN: You're all individuals. 

CROWD: Yes, we're all individuals! 

BRIAN: You're all different. 

CROWD: Yes, we're all different! - 

MAN IN CROWD: I'm not. - 

ANOTHER MAN IN CROWD: Shhh. 

BRIAN: You've all got to work it out for yourselves. 

CROWD: Yes, we've got to work it out for ourselves! 

BRIAN: Exactly. 

CROWD: Tell us more! 

BRIAN: No! That's the point! Don't let anyone tell you what to do! 

BRIAN: Otherwise-Ow! 

MANDY: That's enough. That's enough. 

CROWD: Ooh, 

CROWD: ...that wasn't a minute! - 

MANDY: Oh, yes it was! - 

CROWD: Oh, no it wasn't! 

MANDY: Now, stop that! 

MANDY: And go away! - 

YOUNG MAN in CROWD: Excuse me? - 

MANDY: Yes? - 

YOUNG MAN in CROWD: Are you a virgin? - 

MANDY: I beg your pardon! 

YOUNG MAN in CROWD: Well, if it's not a personal question, are you a virgin? 

MANDY: If it's not a personal question? 

MANDY: How much more personal can you get? 

MANDY: Now, piss off! - 

YOUNG MAN in CROWD: She is. - 

CROWD: Yeah, definitely (grumbling).

Monty Python's Life of Brian

 

Words by Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, and Michael Palin

 

Pictures by Peter Biziou and Terry Jones

 

Monty Python's Life of Brian is available on DVD and Blu-Ray from Anchor Bay Home Video and The Criterion Collection.