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by Willie Waffle
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Catch
A Fire
Set in June 1980
in South
Africa,
Derek Luke stars as Patrick Chamusso – a foreman at the local
oil
refinery. In this
segregated world of
Apartheid, his friends pick on him for being an apolitical sell out who
is too
eager to please “The Man”, but Patrick is doing
alright with a decent job, some
responsibility, a nice family, and the time he needs to coach the local
boys’
soccer team. One
day, Patrick’s soccer
team makes the playoffs, and he takes an unexcused absence from work to
accompany them to the tournament, but it turns out to be a horrible day
to play
hooky.
While
he is
away, anti-Apartheid fighters plant an explosive and detonate it at the
plant. A dreaded
investigator with the
South African Police Security Branch, Nic Vos (Tim Robbins), is called
in to
find the people responsible, his eye quickly turns to Patrick and his
flimsy
alibi, and he will stop at nothing to break the young man.
Will Patrick be
held responsible for the attack? Did
he
do it? Can Patrick
survive the torture?
Even though it
is based on the life story of Chamusso, a major figure in the African
National
Congress, Catch
A Fire quickly steers itself away from politics to become
more
of an action movie, but still has a fantastic performance from Luke to
make up
for it. Director
Phillip Noyce and
writer Shawn Slovo seem to break Catch A
Fire into two distinct
movies – what
happens before the arrest, and Chamusso’s reaction to it
– which slightly
disrupts the flow.
The two parts
need some more exposition in the middle to help us transition from the
intense,
horrific first part if the movie to the more James Bond-like second
part. Plus, it
assumes everyone who goes to the
movie is familiar with that time in South Africa’s history
(which is probably
true, but will not help the movie hold up throughout time, or help
anyone who
doesn’t understand why I ain’t gonna play Sun City). However, the movie is one
that will stand out
this fall because of Luke’s performance.
After wowing us
in Antwone
Fisher a few years ago, Luke has grown as an actor to have
the same
kind of screen presence as Matt Damon. If he keeps putting in
performances like
this, we’ll upgrade him to Leonardo DiCaprio status. Luke is fantastic as he
shows us Chamusso’s
reactions as his world falls apart.
He
takes us through the fear, anger, and desire for revenge Chamusso
experiences,
while also showing his love for family, and questionable decisions he
has made
as well as effortlessly adopting the speech pattern and accent. Best of all, he has the
right intensity, and
lack of it, in each scene.
Robbins has the
harder job of bringing something interesting to a quieter, evil
character, but
also finds his moments to show everything Vos feels as he faces a
majority
population that hates him, and, he worries, wants to hurt him and his
family. It’s
hard to have any kind of sympathy for
Vos, but Robbins comes close, and his performance might be better
explained as
making us understand the character’s motivation.
Catch A
Fire is
solid movie with some flaws.
3 Waffles
(Out Of 4)
Copyright
2006 - WaffleMovies.com
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