Damon, Eastwood, and Freeman in The Human Factor
Invictus (2009) Movie — By Nix on June 3, 2008
Daaaaaaamn, now that’s an A-list! It’s called “The Human Factor”, and Matt Damon and Morgan Freeman will star with Clint Eastwood announced as directing. The movie will be based on a true story, and is about, er, rugby. Yes, rugby. I don’t think anyone outside of an Ivy League school in the States even knows how rugby is played, but I guess that’s going to change by the time “The Human Factor” rolls into theaters. The project was originally announced last year, but only Damon and Freeman were involved then.
Variety has more on the cast and crew, and the story (the real Pienaar, with Mandela, pictured above left):
Damon will play rugby star Francois Pienaar, who created, with Nelson Mandela, an event that gave whites and blacks in South Africa a common cause to rally around as the country was trying to heal from the wounds of apartheid.
The Anthony Peckham-scripted drama is an adaptation of John Carlin’s book “The Human Factor: Nelson Mandela and the Game that Changed the World.”
Mandela, freed from 27 years in prison and elected president, decided to get behind South Africa’s Springboks team when the country was selected as host country for the 1985 Rugby World Cup. The Springboks had been banned from international competition because of the country’s apartheid practices.
The majority of blacks viewed the team as a symbol of exclusion, but they rooted along with white countrymen as the Springboks won in overtime against New Zealand to capture the Cup. Pienaar was the Springboks captain who developed a relationship with Mandela during the team’s run.
Warner Bros. is footing the bill, with the film scheduled to begin production early next year on location in South Africa.
Still don’t know what rugby is? Here is a picture of some guys playing rugby. No, really. That’s a real picture of a rugby game.
Digg It
Stumble It
Tweet It
delicious
RSS
9 Comments
“I don’t think anyone outside of an Ivy League school in the States even knows how rugby is played” – Really? In fact, there are nearly 70,000 registered men, women, boys, and girls playing as part of USA Rugby (www.usarugby.org).
Though I do hope you are correct about this movie helping to bring rugby further into the public eye in the US. It’s about time.
I think the majority of Americans knows football, not rugby. Its a tough game-without the padding and helmets *snicker*
Oh, and the picture is called a scrum….
I have to agree with JWG – I didn’t go to an Ivy League school but started playing rugby in college and have been playing for 6 years…
Rugby is being introduced to kids in high schools, yes, high schools as well as colleges all throughout the US. There are Under-12 (years old) programs in which touch or flag rugby is taught.
This sport is growing in the US on every level, and every rugby player can appreciate the media attention that the sport is (finally) getting.
great to hear about rugby finally getting some attention in the US. I hope the movie will bring even more attention to the sport. i am from South Africa and this sport is HUGE in this country and hope to see the US in the same state in a couple of years time!
Viva Blou Bulle LOL
BTW…. the rugby world cup was in 1995 not 1985…. you really don’t know what your talking about, rugby is the 2nd largest played sport in the world behind scocer, YES bigger than american football, shock horror!
And in fact American Football actually came from rugby. “American football resulted from several major divergences from rugby, most notably the rule changes instituted by Walter Camp, considered the “Father of American Football”.” [Wikipedia, sources provided].
Even then, rugby was quite big in the USA in the early 20th century, especially in California where games drew big crowds. The USA rugby team which won gold medals in the 1920 and 1924 Olympics (rugby was played in four early olympics) was mainly Stanford, Cal-Berkeley and Santa Clara students.
Rugby has a fine hisotry in the USA and it’s not too late to give up playing slow motion pro wrestling in motorbike helmets and return to the REAL GAME. Rugby.
(Rick Boyd, rugby journalist, Perth, Western Australia).
I am a huge rugby fan…The historical and political impact of the Springboks victory even changed Rugby to a professional sport worldwide. Morgan Freeman plays Nelson Mandela, Matt Damon is captain of the South Africa team. All other cast are South African except a couple of monsters – Grant Roberts from the US on the Boks’ and Zak Feaunati a kiwi on the All Blacks… can’t wait.