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Capone Finds CATCH A FIRE Riveting!!
Hey everyone. Capone in Chicago here.
Due to its seemingly dated subject matter (the brutality of police during 1980s, apartheid-era South Africa), my biggest fear is that audiences won’t see Catch a Fire because they’ll think they’ve seen it done several times before on the big screen, most prominently in 1987’s Cry Freedom with a young Denzel Washington as Steven Biko. But Catch A Fire has something of a hidden and far more modern agenda than simply retelling the true-life story of Patrick Chamusso (the exceptional Derek Luke), who was falsely rounded up by police after an attack at the nuclear power plant facility where he worked. Chamusso was tortured by government-sanctioned law enforcement, headed by Tom Robbins’ steely cool Nic Vos, but eventually set free. The police even tortured Chamusso’s wife (newcomer Bonnie Henna) just to get him to talk.
Where Catch a Fire draws its modern parallel is what happens to Chamusso after his release. His rage and anger at what was done to him and his family drives him to join a rebel organization bent on plotting and carrying out attacks against the South African establishment that is holding his people down. Are they terrorists or are they freedom fighters? This is the question posed and pushed to the forefront of the film, a question that has loud echoes in today’s battles against terror.
The film makes the clear point that Chamusso was absolutely the wrong man to mess with in that day and age in South Africa. He had made as much of a good life as a black man in South Africa could at the time. He held a management position at the power plant, and was making probably more than anyone else in the township where he lived. He was the last person the police should has suspected. But the film never makes the mistake of painting Chamusso as a perfect man. He is actively cheating on his wife (a fact that effectively landed him in jail in the first place since he was unwilling to account for missing hours in his timeline when the explosion at the plant happened), a fact that comes back to haunt him when he actually does plot a more substantial bombing of the nuclear facility.
Director Phillip Noyce has carved out a nice career for himself putting the microscope on the world’s gross acts of injustice in such moving works as Rabbit-Proof Fence and The Quiet American (of course, he’s also celebrated covert American military action is such films as Patriot Games and Clear and Present Danger), and Catch a Fire may be his finest effort.
What is so unusual and riveting about this particular story is the relationship between Chamusso and Vos. It’s almost as if Vos is fully aware that he is caught in a brutality machine he’s caught up in, but he doesn’t have the strength to end his participation in it. In many ways, he sees clearly the end to the current way of life but decides to let it catch up with him rather than take steps to ending the practices of torture himself. There’s a scene in which Vos brings Chamusso to his home for dinner (while he’s still under arrest), and you can’t help but get a glimpse at how life should be between the two men and the two races.
Luke and Robbins don’t have that many scenes together, but when they share the screen, the tension level is palpable. They represent so much to each other and to us that you feel as if the entire future of the civilized world rests on their encounters. I’m not ruining anything by telling you that Chamusso was eventually caught and sent to the same island prison where Nelson Mandela spent so many years. And we do get an almost unnecessary sequence in which Chamusso spots an aged Vos and has to make the decision whether to enact his revenge or not. Make sure to stick around to the end of the film for documentary footage of the real Chamusso, updating us on his current efforts in South Africa.
Catch a Fire is one of the finest examples of a film telling two stories on two levels. The juxtaposing of Chamusso and Vos’ lives provides the surface-level tale, which is fascinating on its own. But when you include the subtext about how fighting terrorists can result in creating more terrorists, you can’t help but take pause in today’s global situation and sadly see how little the world has changed.
Capone
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Oh Biko, Biko, because Biko /
Oh Biko, Biko, because Biko... -
I met Clarence Thomas a few days ago and a friend of mine asked him about the writ of habeas corpus being suspended for enemy combatants, blah blah... his response?
"Trust your government."
Just thought that was special. -
I'm no blood-thirtsy violence-porn fanboy but what's up with that? Given the subject matter, armed rebellion, torture, people shooting other people, etc, I'd have thought it would have been rated R. Maybe they only say "fuck" once.
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Damn you Michael Bay
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NOW! If that talkback is broken get it the hell outta here!
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my review IN SEPTEMBER!" but in response I will not.
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Damn you MCMLXXVI
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Well one notable difference in the whole freedom fighters/terrorists debate when regarding Iraq, is the fact that the insurgencies are not fighting for freedom. What they have in mind is an installment of a tyrannical theocracy much like Iran. That is also main reason the aftermath of the Iraq invasion has gone so awry. The secular middle class was simply not strong enough to seize power in the political vacuum the invasion created. It was doomed from the start regardless of how inept the invasion and the occupation have been handled.
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Every time I see Robbins now, all I hear is him mumbling about "vampiyaz" in Mystic River...
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Yes, "Trust your government." Of course, he couldn't say too much since the Gitmo cases prompted passage of the Military Detainee Act and whatnot (possibility the legislation could come before the bench). The gist of it was basically: "Abraham Lincoln suspended the writ and we're still here. Don't worry. Trust your government. Next question?"
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The practices of an oppressive government create the very rebels they're designed to fight.
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Hopefully when I go see this film there won't be any fifteen years olds w/their dates complaining there isn't enough shit blowing up and there's no big CGI-actionfest climax.
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And all they showed me was all these people being afraid and hiding and shit. What a gyp!
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I read an article (http://tinyurl.com/dz9a7) that mentioned water boarding, it says CIA operatives only lasted 14 seconds during the procedure. I'm curious which technique is the one employed. The article says cellophane over the mouth, larger media outlets a towel and then reading some Eastern European articles they are thinking of Inquisition techniques of placing a funnel or tube down the esophagus and forcing the swallowing of large quantities of water. In any event, torture was another topic that Clarence Thomas couldn't discuss.
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...is such a lonely, lonely guy. The hidden guilt he feels over the Mark Foley scandal has really screwed with his brain. He needs to be brought back to the light. Won't someone please play with him?
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When you obviously enjoy "playing" with him so much yourself?
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Yeah, it was kind of like a cat batting around a ball of string, wasn't it...
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Oct 29, 2006 7:53:08 PM CST
Capone Thinks Terrorists are "Freedom Fighters"
by neo con snake plissken
Go blow Tim Robbins.
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you enormous douchebag.
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I enjoy tweaking the fucking moonbats who peruse the site. Yes, I am an enormous douchebag. I enjoy it. So, Son of Batman. Enjoy. You are nothing but a festering boil on Tim Robbins ass.
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Not sure how Capone sees this as a character with flaws. It is pretty much accepted that black men cheat on their wives, infidelity is mainly a white concept, except for the French. Not that it's encouraged, it's just not as big a deal. Capone's review tells more about him than the movie.
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I saw this film last night and dug it. It's not perfect, in my opinion, since I would've enjoyed it with an R-rating a bit more, but there were some scenes in the film that really moved me. Especially the two funerals taking place at the same time, intercut with contrasting music and expressions of rage-filled sadness in both locations, was beautifully shot and edited. It was one of the most memorable funeral scenes I've ever seen in a film or on television. I think "Catch A Fire" is a simple story given real tension and life by Phillip Noyce, whose "Rabbit-Proof Fence" I also dug a few years ago. Lately he seems to be directing movies about natives who fought the system, who fought repression because they couldn't take it anymore, who endured life-threatening circumstances to buck the system and bring hope to their families and, thus, their people. As long as the stories aren't heavy handed and are creatively told, as Noyce is able to do, I enjoy such movies. "City of God," was much the same way, telling a story about generations of the world's poorest of the poor in Rio De Janeiro's favelas, giving audiences a glimpse into the harsh realities of people not white. Everyone, including Noyce, would likely agree "City of God" is a harsher and far more memorable film than "Catch a Fire," but I thought Patrick Chamusso's story was every bit as compelling as, say, "The Queen" or "Henry the Fifth." Can't wait to see the R-rated Director's Cut.
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With sprinkles
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Noyce does pretty much the best commentary tracks out there. Instead of describing what's on screen like most lame directors do he essentially gives a 90 minutes essay about the film, what it means, things that happened on set, and film making in general. Even his commentary for The Saint is outstanding.
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