Mandela: A long walk to freedom movie review

HE WAS the last true crusader of his kind and his death last year reminded us all just what some people went through for humanity. But does this new film about Mandela's life do the great man justice?

JUST as an oppressive racist regime could not hold back Nelson Mandela, a film telling his staggering life story stands little chance of truly capturing his inspirational essence of the man.

Which is not to say this understandably respectful and sombre biopic (adapted from Mandela's 1995 autobiography) doesn't give it a red hot go.

A subtle, not-too-earnest performance by Idris Elba in the title role is definitely the best reason to stick with the picture, even when it sluggishly recites those parts of the tale we know all too well.

The first act is far livelier than most unfamiliar with the Mandela legend would suspect.

As a swaggering young lawyer in Johannesburg in the 1940s, Mandela was quite the ladies' man.

His first wife and their growing family were not about to curtail his relentless pursuit of the opposite sex in that era.

Then there is the call to arms Mandela hears only faintly at first, but cannot ignore. In 1948, the South African government begins sharpening a pointed set of anti-black laws that will come to be known as apartheid.

Mandela becomes a prime activist, then a key leader of the African National Congress, his people's only worthwhile resistance to the crackdown.

Britain Royal Premiere Mandela: Long Walk To Freedom

It is at this point A Long Walk to Freedom goes into the first of many short periods of autopilot storytelling, condensing Mandela's many achievements as a free man with the ANC into a virtual list with expository dialogue.

Once Mandela and his fellow ANC spearheads are sentenced to life imprisonment, the film again finds itself skimming the surface of a tale that courses deep into the history of race relations all over the world.

However, it must be said that director Justin Chadwick does eventually finds a way to put give some scope to Mandela's momentous journey once he gets to depicting the famous release after 27 years behind bars.

What A Long Walk to Freedom also does well is restore some much-needed context to Mandela's complicated relationship with his second wife, Winnie, who was quite an effective activist in her own right.

Not the most efficiently scripted (nor edited) movie of this type you will ever see, but not once diminishes the stature of its imposing subject.

mandela

MANDELA: A LONG WALK TO FREEDOM [M]

Rating: 3/5

Director: Justin Chadwick (The Other Boleyn Girl)

Starring: Idris Elba, Naomie Harris, Tony Kgoroge, Riaad Moosa

"A small victory will suffice when a life is too big for the big "