{"id":176425409,"date":"2013-09-15T01:21:41","date_gmt":"2013-09-15T06:21:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/?p=176425409"},"modified":"2013-09-15T01:21:41","modified_gmt":"2013-09-15T06:21:41","slug":"review-movie-mandela-long-walk-to-freedom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/2013\/09\/15\/review-movie-mandela-long-walk-to-freedom\/","title":{"rendered":"REVIEW: Movie\u2014Mandela: Long Walk To Freedom"},"content":{"rendered":"

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SEPTEMBER 12TH, 2013<\/span><\/h2>\n

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Long Walk to Toronto<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/h2>\n
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BY\u00a0ANDREA MEESON AND MELISSA LEVIN<\/strong>
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It is a warm and breezy\u00a0Sunday\u00a0afternoon in Toronto, just the kind of weather that makes us question whether we should be going into a dark movie house to catch one the \u201chottest\u201d screenings at this year\u2019s international film fest, or hanging a left to a sunny outdoor patio to quench our thirst with a cold beer and good conversation. It was always going to be a toss-up; sadly we choose the movie tickets and are taken for a ride!<\/span><\/p>\n

The ticket-holders queue is the beginning of what was to be a long and painful afternoon. The \u201cfestival of festivals\u201d, as the\u00a0Toronto International Film Festival<\/span><\/a>\u00a0(September 5-15) is regarded by many, has become something of a cattle drive for viewers of the common garden variety: no chance of jumping the queue, Jozi-style; these two South Africans are promptly herded, with border-collie precision, to the back of the .5km line, as if to share in a little of that long walk to freedom of Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela before the curtain is raised on the celluloid version. Thus, we join nearly 1,500 others in the Princess of Wales Theatre \u2013 no irony lost on the screening venue, its colonial heritage clearly stamped in brocade and gold plate, and its namesake, the departed Diana, being another overstated fan of the aforementioned \u2018Madiba\u2019: the symbol of a brand of truth and reconciliation that has forgiven her ancestors their trespasses for 400 years and counting.<\/span><\/p>\n

Once seated we are given a snappy introduction to the director of \u201cMandela: Long Walk to Freedom<\/span><\/a>,\u201d a young Brit, Justin Chadwick (resume includes\u00a0The Other Boleyn Girl<\/span><\/a>), who assures us that prior to shooting the film he spent a year in South Africa, as a new breed of \u201coutsider\u201d \u2013 the \u201clistening\u201d and \u201cobserving\u201d type (seemingly familiar with the current-speak as per Guide to a Post-Colonial Gaze), who \u201ctalked with the family\u201d and \u201cthe comrades\u201d (another homogenous brand of characters that doth a struggle make) and followed the sage advice of one, unnamed member of the latter lot, who said, \u201cbe sure to tell the story of the man.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

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Such words of commitment provide but temporary respite from those of the renowned South African producer, Anant Singh (Yesterday<\/span><\/a>), who offers a slick historical overview of the genesis of the most expensive South African film made to date, focusing on his personal relationship with Mandela, to whom he wrote letters as young, \u2018activist\u2019 filmmaker (seemingly to get his paws on the rights to the story of stories). And here he is, finally, on a stage at one of the world\u2019s most moneyed film festivals, offering the big budget work \u2013 30 script drafts and nearly 25 years in the making (with a little help from Hollywood\u2019s Harvey Weinstein). As the afternoon progresses we are apt to conclude that another 25 years might have been called for.<\/span><\/p>\n

But the stage is set and the curtain goes up on what we suspected all along was going to be a watered-down take on \u201cthe man\u201d and the many events and people that shaped him. What we get is a vessel so shot through with holes as to render Mandela a one-dimensional messiah, his comrades mere disciples, and a mass movement of millions of South Africans either hapless victims, flag-waving backdrops who burst into song at mass rallies (in poorly translated English to accommodate those for whom the country\u2019s political vernacular remains unsubtitleable), or marauding perpetrators of violence.<\/span><\/p>\n

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