Home > Blogs > Sir Critic on Cinema > Archives > 2006 > October > 27 > Entry
“Catch a Fire” heats up without igniting
“Catch a Fire� reminded me of one of those educational “dramatization� films I used to watch in school, with all the good and bad that entails.
On the upside, “Catch a Fire� is intriguing in that it showed me a side of the fight against apartheid that I hadn’t known much about, and I came away feeling fascinated and moved. On the downside, the movie sometimes feels more like a spoonful of medicine than a shot in the arm.
The film tells the true story of Patrick Chamusso (Derek Luke) who in 1980 is wrongly accused of and imprisoned for carrying out an attack on the nuclear power plant where he works in South Africa. Although he is eventually released, the police’s torture prompts him to join the African National Congress, the very “terrorists� he was accused of conspiring with. He figures he and his family might as well have been wronged for a reason.
The always-reliable Luke throws himself into his role, investing it with great passion. Tim Robbins, playing police inspector Nic Vos, tries to show the character’s duality, sometimes making him look evil, and sometimes showing a man honestly trying to do his job.
I wish the film had looked harder at that duality. Sometimes it works very well, especially when we see Patrick undergoing his ANC training. He wants to be one of the “good guys,� and yet, as a man willing to die for his cause, he becomes scarily reminiscent of modern-day terrorists. These scenes reminded me of “Paradise Now,� last year’s outstanding movie about Muslim suicide bombers.
Phillip Noyce’s direction is at its strongest in these scenes. Having built his reputation on thrillers like “Dead Calm� and “Patriot Games,� Noyce skillfully uses his action techniques not only to thrill, but to make an impact, as he did in “Rabbit-Proof Fence� and “The Quiet American.� The training sequences are exciting, yet unnerving at the same time.
Slovo’s screenplay doesn’t walk that line as successfully. Like too many well-meaning writers, he resorts to telling rather than showing because he thinks his words will make more of an impact than the images, especially when he resorts to villainizng Nic Vos. This is understandable, given that Slovo is the son of ANC leader Joe Slovo, but his tendency to preach makes “Catch a Fire� feel more earnest than enlightening. Ironically, Luke’s breakout movie, “Antwone Fisher,� suffered the same flaws.
Like “Fisher� however, “Catch a Fire� has enough passion to generate heat. I only wish the movie could have been “hot� enough to live up to its name.
GRADE: B
