Welcome back, everyone! I hope you enjoyed reading my post from last week about the three movies to avoid, especially if you love the books as much as I do. In contrast, today, I bring you a list of three splendid movies. Well, to be accurate, I should say three splendid actors. Each of this actor played the role of the real-life personality to such perfection that I forgot all about the actual biography and was left awe-struck and wide-eyed at the sheer brilliance of their acting! So, here is my list of three movies which excelled as adaptations from biographies:
1. Morgan Freeman – “Invictus”
The movie, “Invictus” is based on the book, “Playing the Enemy: Nelson Mandela and the Game That Made a Nation,” written by British journalist, John Carlin. The book relates the events in South Africa before and during the 1995 Rugby World Cup. In April 1994, Nelson Mandela, the flag-bearer of the anti-apartheid revolution in South Africa won the first free elections to become the first black president of the country. But being the visionary, Mandela was, he was concerned that his party’s victory, secured by the landslide of black votes, lacked the support of the whites. This was important to Mandela because the whites held more than enough capital and arsenal to threaten his new democracy. As Carlin writes in his book: “The election had created a new South Africa; now Mandela’s task was to create South Africans.”
This book details Mandela’s inspirational and unique campaign to unite the aggrieved blacks and the scared whites around a sporting event, a game of rugby. Yes, this book was a movie in-the-making from the day the first word was penned. The book was published by Penguin Press in 2008. The movie, “Invictus” was released in 2009 and I can’t imagine a better adaptation of the book from any aspect. The movie was destined for success with Clint Eastwood as the director, actor Morgan Freeman as Nelson Mandela and actor Matt Damon as Francois Pienaar, the captain of the rugby national team.
The movie was named “Invictus” because it was one of the poems that inspired Nelson Mandela during his 23 years in prison. He shared this poem with Francois and it is believed that it played a major role in inspiring the captain and the white South African team to play the tournament to win the hearts of the blacks and unite the country. “Invictus” is a short Victorian poem by the English poet William Ernest Henley. It was written in 1875 and published in 1888. Yes, the real life story catapulted the movie to the heights of success but Morgan Freeman elevated it to an unimaginable level. He lived, ate, walked and spoke Mandela in that movie even better than the real Mandela. I read the book after watching the movie and the poem has also been inspiring me for more than a decade now. Even today, the word, “Mandela” conjures up the image of Morgan Freeman as Nelson Mandela rather than the real Mandela in my mind. I would also like to mention Matt Damon’s impeccable acting too. A must watch for you, if you have not yet done so!
2. Ben Kingsley – “Gandhi”
American writer, John Richard Briley was already well-known for screenplays of biographical films when Richard Attenborough approached him for one on Mahatma Gandhi in 1980. Attenborough had several failed attempts from many famous writers before he decided on Briley. If writer Briley lived up to expectations for a brilliant screenplay, actor Ben Kingsley as Mahatma Gandhi, surpassed all levels of expectations from everyone, critics and supporters alike. And the irony is that Briley did not agree with Attenborough when Kingsley was selected for the role.
It is not easy to adapt such a well-loved global personality like Mahatma Gandhi into a book or a screenplay or a movie. Challenges of creating political controversies, upsetting the heirs and more of such multiple factors are always in play here, especially when it involves such a diverse subcontinent like India. “Gandhi” is a long movie, it runs to a little over three hours and after watching it, I call it nothing short of an epic. Being someone who has been immersed in the history of Indian Independence Movement from my first class of history in school, I salute Ben Kingsley for living up to the phenomenon Mahatma Gandhi actually was and still is in India. Both Briley and Attenborough agreed while accepting their Oscars (Yes, the movie won three Oscars in 1983), that Kingsley dominated the movie from the first scene to the last. The script did have big roles for other important heroes of the Indian Independence Movement like Jawaharlal Nehru, Sardar Vallabhai Patel, Mohammed Ali Jinnah, Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, etc, to name a few. Casting for each character was as excellent as Attenborough is known for, handpicking the best suited one from across the globe, but Kingsley outperformed them all by a huge margin. Even if you are not a history buff, I would still recommend you to go watch this and experience the magnificence!
3. Liam Neeson – “Schindler’s List”
The quote “Those who forget history are condemned to repeat it” is from the book, “The Life of Reason: Reason in Common Sense,” written by American (originally, Spanish) philosopher George Santayana. Every time I read an article or a book, watch a documentary or a movie on the Holocaust, that quote by Santayana haunts me for days. I don’t think I will ever get over the horrible feeling of disgust and emptiness, though I am no way related to any kind of effects from this event. How could it happen will be a question left unanswered forever. Yet in the lowest depths of such utter hopelessness, we have a humane human like Oskar Schindler who will rise above it all and renew your faith in humanity.
“The Schindler’s Ark” is a Booker Prize-winning historical novel published in 1982 by Australian novelist Thomas Keneally. This is a story of Oskar Schindler, a member of the Nazi party who turns into an unlikely hero by saving 1,200 Jews from Poland, Germany and Czech Republic. Since exact details are unknown of every real event, the author reconstructed stories to reflect reality as best as possible. If the story touched you raw, Steven Spielberg decided to rip you even more with a superb adaptation of it, in his movie, “The Schindler’s List” in 1993. The movie was shot in black and white and that created an effect of timelessness around it. Spielberg selected Liam Neeson, to play the lead role with superstar Ben Kingsley as Schindler’s Jewish accountant, Itzhak Stern. Neeson was not a known face then but he outshone Kingsley and actually became a legend himself after this movie.
I watched the movie first and was then inspired to read the book afterwards. The delicate scenes with its not so subtle impact made me cry buckets throughout the movie, continues even when I do a repeat watch for the umpteenth time. Beware to the most skeptical viewer, this movie will touch a raw chord in you. I remain overwhelmed by the last scene when Schindler breaks down emotionally in front of a huge crowd of Jews whom he saved, crying out to Stern, “I didn’t save enough.” I was “taken” (pun, intended) by Neeson from this movie, heart and soul!
This is all for today. But before saying bye, I have to confess that I already have a few more to add to this list, so this is not the end of it. I would love to hear more of such names from you too and also your view on this trio. So, please leave me a comment below so that we can compare notes and gape with wonder on such jaw dropping performances. Keep reading, keep watching, till next time!
Watch What You Read! 