Up 275% in popularity this week. See why on IMDbPro.

Clint Eastwood

Anthony Peckham (screenplay)
John Carlin (book)

View company contact information for Invictus on IMDbPro.

11 December 2009 (USA) more

Biography | Drama more

His people needed a leader. He gave them a champion. more

Nelson Mandela, in his first term as the South African President, initiates a unique venture to unite the apartheid-torn land: enlist the national rugby team on a mission to win the 1995 Rugby World Cup. full summary | add synopsis

Nominated for 3 Golden Globes. Another 3 wins & 8 nominations more

SAG Awards 2010: Predictions – Best Supporting Actor
 (From Alt Film Guide. 16 December 2009, 11:12 PM, PST)
SAG Awards 2010: Predictions Best Actor
 (From Alt Film Guide. 16 December 2009, 6:04 PM, PST)

As a South African, I can tell you the entertaining, inspiring and enjoyable "Invictus" exceeded all my expectations. more (37 total)

The Human Factor (USA) (working title)
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Rated PG-13 for brief strong language.

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USA:134 min

USA

English

Color

2.35 : 1 more

Dolby Digital

USA:PG-13 (certificate #45710)

Cape Town, South Africa more

Warner Bros. Pictures more

Morgan Freeman, who has been a friend of Nelson Mandela for many years, prepared for his role as Mandela by watching some tapes of him to perfect his accent and rhythm of speaking. However, the most difficult part was Mandela's charisma, which could not be duplicated: "I wanted to avoid acting like him; I needed to BE him, and that was the biggest challenge. When you meet Mandela, you know you are in the presence of greatness, but it is something that just emanates from him. He moves people for the better; that is his calling in life. Some call it the Madiba magic. I'm not sure that magic can be explained." more

[from trailer]
Mrs. Pinnear: What does he want?
Francois Pienaar: I think he wants us to win the World Cup...
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Featured in "The Jay Leno Show: (#1.57)" (2009) more

Invictus (PG-13)

Ebert:     Users:     You: Rate this movie right now    

BY ROGER EBERT / December 9, 2009

Cast & Credits Francois Matt Damon Nelson Mandela Morgan Freeman Tony Jason Tshabalala Springbok coach Louis Minnaar Francois' father Patrick Lyster Mary Leleti Khumalo Warner Bros. presents a film directed by Clint Eastwood. Written by Anthony Peckham, based on the book by John Carlin. Running time: 134 minutes. Rated PG-13 (for brief strong language). Printer-friendly » E-mail this to a friend »

Morgan Freeman has been linked to one biopic of Nelson Mandela or another for at least 10 years. Strange that the only one to be made centers on the South African rugby team. The posters for Clint Eastwood's "Invictus" feature Matt Damon in the foreground, with Freeman looming behind him in shadowy nobility. I can imagine the marketing meetings during which it was lamented that few Americans care much about about Mandela and that Matt Damon appeals to a younger demographic.
Screw 'em, is what I would have contributed. The achievement of Nelson Mandela is one of the few shining moments in recent history. Here is a man who was released after 24 years of breaking rocks in prison and sleeping on the floor to assume leadership of the nation that jailed him. His personal forgiveness of white South Africa was the beacon that illuminated that nation's Truth and Reconciliation Commissions, one of the very few examples in history of people who really had much to forgive, and forgave it. Let us not forget that both black and white had reasons to grieve, and reasons to forgive, and that in many cases they were facing the actual murderers of their loved ones.

Compared to that, what really does it matter that an underdog Springbok team, all white with one exception, won the World Cup in rugby in the first year of Mandela's rule? I understand that in a nation where all the races are unusually obsessed by sport, the World Cup was an electrifying moment when the pariah state stood redeemed before the world -- even if soccer is the black man's game there, and rugby is the white's. It was important in the way the Beijing Olympics were important to China.

Clint Eastwood, I believe, understood all of these things and also sought to make a film he believed he could make, in an area where he felt a visceral connection. Eastwood is too old and too accomplished to have an interest in making a film only for money. He would have probably read the screenplays for the previous Mandela projects. They all had one thing in common: They didn't get made. It was universally agreed that Morgan Freeman was the right actor (Mandela and he met and got along famously), but the story, financing and deal never came together. Eastwood made the film that did get made.

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 -- Francois 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.