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Updated Friday, January 15, 2010 9:40 am TWN, By Kenneth Turan, Los Angeles Times




	To get the Springboks to work with him, Mandela uses his considerable ability to charm to enlist the help of their normally apolitical captain, Francois Pienaar. Though he's noticeably shorter than the 6-foot-3-inch athlete, the chameleon-like Matt Damon has gone buff and blond, transforming himself into a believable participant in this very rough sport. (Courtesy of Warner Bros.) Enlarge Photo

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Invictus 打不倒的勇者

“Invictus” also shows us that Mandela paid a personal price for his political convictions. Estranged from both his wife and his eldest daughter, he lives completely alone and when someone on his security detail asks about his family, he replies “I have a very large family: 42 million.”

Aside from his chief of staff, Brenda Mazibuko (Adjoa Andoh), security specialists Jason Tshabalala (Tony Kgoroge) and Linga Moonsamy (Patrick Mofokeng) are closest to him, and they are shocked when he insists they integrate their team with men from the Special Branch, the former enforcers of apartheid.

“Forgiveness liberates the soul,” he tells them. “That's why it's such a powerful weapon.”

Those close to Mandela are even more shocked when he decides to fully embrace the Springboks in the 1995 Rugby World Cup, even though the team is so weak that only its host-nation status got it into the tournament. If his government is to have the support of the white elite, he says, “we have to prove we are not what they feared. We have to surprise them with compassion.”

To get the Springboks to work with him, Mandela uses his considerable ability to charm to enlist the help of their normally apolitical captain, Francois Pienaar. Though he's noticeably shorter than the 6-foot-3-inch athlete, the chameleon-like Damon has gone buff and blond, transforming himself into a believable participant in this very rough sport. Pienaar's role has also been buffed up (in real life, the team's manager, Morne du Plessis, was also influential), but Damon carries it convincingly.

Fully half of “Invictus” is taken up with that World Cup tournament, as South Africa takes on the great nations of the rugby world, including the fierce All Blacks of New Zealand (named for their dark uniforms). Though the action on the field (expertly photographed by Tom Stern and crisply edited by Joel Cox and Gary D. Roach) can be followed in a general way by nonfans, the film could have used more explanation, which, an article by screenwriter Peckham in Script Magazine hints, was written but didn't make the final cut.

“Invictus” is named after a poem by William Ernest Henley, a favorite of Mandela, who was inspired by its last two lines: “I am the master of my fate: I am the captain of my soul.”

This popular Victorian-era work is not on the top of school reading lists anymore, but it just might be the latest old-fashioned form that Eastwood's skill brings back to life.

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