Episode 6.5 - Invictus Review 7/10

Invictus - 2009 - Clint Eastwood

Sports have the ability to accomplish what no other force on this earth could ever hope to achieve. They can uplift and inspire, create heroes and legends whose stories do the same for decades. They can unite generations, races, a people, a country, a world and do it all without the requirement of understanding. For this, they are more powerful than religion, than politics, than war. There are no losers in sports; humanity wins every time.

Invictus tries to demonstrate this point, using the 1995 Rugby World Cup as the catalyst that will spark a wave of forgiveness and unity in a post-apartheid South Africa. Nelson Mandela (played BRILLIANTLY by Morgan Freeman) recognizes the potential here and becomes determined to make the South African Springboks a symbol to bring his country together.

Sadly, it fails. Usually this is the part of the review where I give you the quick summary and tell you what happens in the story, but I feel this is important. There is a very cardinal rule about sports films: the power and emotion of sports does not come from the game itself, but the story and characters that surround it. Think of Miracle, Cool Runnings, The Natural, hell, Searching For Bobby Fischer. These are movies where you don’t have to know the game to know what it means because you watch the environment around it evolve with the suspense and excitement of the competition. Invictus just lost itself and felt that the idea “having the World Cup join together a country” was going to be a strong enough goal that you wouldn’t notice if the movie just ignored it after a while. What it resulted in was a boring movie about a sport that I still don’t care about.

We follow Nelson Mandela for most of this film. Fresh out of spending 27 years in prison for his actions against apartheid, he gets elected as President of South Africa and pulls the ol’ “the best way to heal is forgive” trick on the country, which frustrates a good part of the population. For rugby fans, it especially frustrates them, as their team, the Springboks, are filled with players that serve as constant reminders of the apartheid era. They’re big, they’re intimidating, they’re European, and they’re white. People go to the games to root against them. As a result, they are the laughing stock of the sport, like District 5 from The Mighty Ducks without the goofy falling sound effects.

Mandela sees this as a perfect opportunity to start the healing process. If he can get the country behind this team, maybe the tolerance will spread through South Africa like a disease. I apologize if that’s too cliché. The Springboks are in the World Cup by default for some reason that isn’t explained very well…it could just be out of pity, like the fat kid at kickball. He’s picked last, but he does get to play.

Mandela becomes fascinated with the World Cup format, meets the team and invites team Captain Francois Pienaar (Matt Damon in his most worthless role) over for tea to give him a pep talk to motivate them, even though that chat is really “I’m going to spout off meaningful lines that show how much smarter I am than you.” You can see his passion, see his excitement to watch his plan unfold, but sadly, nothing else in the movie really supports this idea.

The rugby team itself doesn’t even support it. They know they’re a joke, except for Chester, the only black guy on the team who is the country’s hero for that reason alone. They don’t even know the anthem of their country and don’t care to learn it. They have no strategy, little passion, and no reason to actually care about the players. Invictus invests no time in their story; as people they don’t matter. It’s the game that matters (see “cardinal rule” above…).

Alas, the World Cup begins and Invictus assumes that because there are fans cheering for South Africa in the stadium a thousand miles away from the actual country, Mandela is obviously making notable progress. The Springbok’s first opponent is Australia, who is a powerhouse of a team to beat. This is going to be very difficult for them, but the team wins and moves on. Surprised? No? Neither were they. No response, hardly a celebration and remember, they were supposed to be a laughing stock. It’s treated like this was expected.

The population of South Africa doesn’t cheer…or maybe they do…you never see them. If you’ve seen Cool Runnings about the Jamaican bobsled team, every victory, every turn ignited that country like a joint. Damn it, there I go with the clichés again. You saw people celebrating in the bars, you heard announcers in disbelief, hell, you heard music! Invictus forgets the fun of the competition, the thrill of the suspense and makes it almost feel inappropriate to cheer. The underdog story doesn’t feel like the underdog story, it feels like a story about the best team in the world going to a tournament and winning. Hip. Hip. Hooray.

I appreciate the story of the 1995 South African Rugby Team. I appreciate what it meant, I understand how it could have the impact it tries to present in Invictus. But I also know there are better ways to spotlight it. Show us the evolution of the people around the story. Make us excited about the progress of this team. Film it in such a way that you don’t have to know the rules to understand that something was a good play or was a key turning point in the match. Make me have to stop myself from cheering because for that moment, I completely forgot I was watching a movie. This is what sports movies should be about; this is what makes them great. The ultimate goal is never your saving grace and, sadly, Clint Eastwood just missed that, leaving us wanting to feel something…but coming up flat.

For the good set up and incredible acting from Morgan Freeman as Nelson Mandela, I give this a 7 dustbusters out of 10. It wasn’t bad, but it was unbelievably disappointing.