Clint Eastwood who directed the true story of Nelson Mandela and the national rugby team reuniting South Africa in “Invictus” shares his thoughts while making the film. Though he was a great fan of Mandela personally, he knows nothing about rugby.
After the Los Angeles premiere, Eastwood shares by phone, “No, I didn’t know much about rugby, except that it was a rough sport. But ‘Million Dollar Baby’ wasn’t a boxing movie, either. It was a father/daughter love story.”
In the same sense as he described “Million Dollar Baby”, the film also revolves on a similar premise of a father’s love for his country. Imprisoned for 27 years for his activism against white rule in South Africa, Mandela after his release surprisingly becomes the country’s president. He shocks citizens even more when he unites previous white cabinet members with his new black bodyguards.
“Invictus” covers Mandela’s release until the victory of the rugby national team Springboks in the World Cup. In the film, Mandela is portrayed by look-alike and sound-alike Morgan Freeman. Early in the film, Mandela notes how “all the whites cheer for South Africa and all the blacks cheer for England.” He decides to change that and pursue the idea of creating Springboks a true national team serving as foundation for the unity of South Africa’s people.
In reality, the film sheds light on sports legend when the terrible Springboks, under Mandela’s guidance and inspiration, won the 1995 World Cup. “Invictus” however chooses to leave out this part. Eastwood fervently explains, “The script was very straight-forward. What happened in 1995 was dramatic enough in itself; it didn’t need to be pumped up.”
Freeman brought the script created by Anthony Peckham based from John Carlin’s book “Playing the Enemy: Nelson Mandela and the Game that Made a Nation” to Eastwood. He expertly chose the director who gave him Oscar nominations for both 1994’s “Unforgiven” and 2004’s “Million Dollar Baby”.
As a director, Eastwood has been known to be loyal with the final scripts he is working on. Scribe Paul Haggis for “Million Dollar Baby” shares how the finished movie was exactly how he had written the Oscan nominated screenplay.
Eastwood confirms this statement saying, “I don’t see any sense in taking a script that you think is perfect and changing it. Just as I would never start making a movie with a script I don’t think is right, I’d never change one that is.”
During production for “Invictus” Eastwood also had the opportunity to meet the real Nelson Mandela. He cheerfully states, “I did get to meet Mandela when he visited the set about half-way through production. He’s a very charismatic guy. The funny thing was that Morgan was in the room and it was hard to tell where one ended and the other began.”
