Speech on Invictus the Film

Good Morning Class and Miss.
Today I will be discussing with you how the film invictious relates to hope and courage, the film works around two main characters, Morgan Freeman as South African President Nelson Mandela and Matt Damon as François Pienaar, the captain of the South African rugby union team the Springboks.

The film displays that hope and courage are very important aspects of Presidential leadership; Nelson Mandela is displayed in the film to be both hopeful and courageous. The scene from the film I have seen to best display these features; is best titled ‘people are wrong’.
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I have chosen this scene because after just listening to it you already learn so much about Nelson Mandela’s character, with a small understanding of the basic storyline of the film you know that nelson Mandela at this point in the film has officially decided to support the south African rugby team, with a even smaller understanding with would comprehend this as irrelevant to hope and courage due to the fact that he is supporting his own country’s team, but the black population of the country don’t support there own team and are often supporting other teams with a mixed race of players such as the English.

This is due the racial discrimination of black African citizens from the African rugby industry over the past 50 or so years; they see the team as a racial discriminatory icon against the black population. Knowing this you will now understand that Nelson Mandela’s goal is to change this as a first step to his goal of what he calls ‘a rainbow nation’
This scene displays the courage behind this challenge his aims to conquer through the negative bantering of his sectary, his sectary tells him that he risk’s his party’s standing and his voters that brought him to power, which evidently means loosing his position as the president of south Africa come the next election.
Despite these statements made by the sectary being somewhat true he courageously accepts the risk and proceeds to try eliminating racial inequality in South Africa. To move forward despite the risk’s not only shows courage but also hope, without the hope to achieve his goal it would lead to doubt.
Film tactics like camera angles and sounds play a vital role in getting the feeling, emotion, position of character etc in the movie through to the audience. In this scene it opens with a panning shot of a walkway with business men and/or politicians with a background sound of footsteps on the concrete pavement this emphasizes the seriousness of nelson Mandela’s position giving you the impression of such a formal and wealthy structure around him. This enhances the feeling of what he is putting at risk due to his hope and courage towards the Springboks being supported by everyone, not just the white population.
The camera angle whilst they are walking to the car stays front on for the majority of the walk, this angle is used to display Mandela’s hope through the comparison of him and his sectary’s feelings about this decision. It shows the sectary as agitated, holing her books, walking in a tense manner and making quick head gestures towards him whilst talking. Mandela however walks calmly, talks calmly and makes no quick movements that imply lack of confidence.