Totally Unauthorized

The mandatory ending for every sports film

This must be South Africa month for me.

Last week we saw the Athol Fugard play, Coming Home, Wednesday Tom Jacobson asked if we wanted to go to South Africa with he and his wife (then told me yesterday that the tour was sold out) and last night we saw Invictus, the true story of Nelson Mandella and the South African Rugby team.

Coming into office in 1994, Mandela (ably portrayed by Morgan Freeman) was faced with a nation completely divided along racial and economic lines.  Trying to find a way to close that breach, he hits upon the the Springboks, the national rugby team.  Dispirited, disorganized and uninspired, the team was still a favorite of the whites and a negative symbol to the black population. Mandella meets with Francois Pienaar (played by a very bulked-up and buffed-out Matt Damon) and urges him to lead the team to victory in the upcoming World Cup. As a method of inspiration, Mandella recites the poem that he memorized in prison, Invictus, by William Ernest Henley:

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.

From here, the movie veers wildly from historical biopic to Rocky XVIII, as the Springboks get inspired, win the hearts of their countrymen and begin their improbable march to victory, and the country achieves some small manner of unity cheering for them.

Invictus is directed with characteristic style and restraint by Clint Eastwood.  Rugby is an incredibly violent sport, and Eastwood manages to show this without the least unnecessary gore or glorification.  As one would expect from him, there are no significant parts for women in this film–Clint tells manly stories in a manly way, wimmenfolk are just there to assist.

Scoring an impressive 77 on the Tomatometer, we found this movie to be entirely worth our time. Whether you want history or sports, Invictus delivers the goods.