Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom

[missunique]

Watched this on Sunday, great movie. Idris was excellent in this movie. Very emotional in the cinema.

[Beate]

The FF post about the Virgin screening is an early alert. Normally screenings should only be posted once they are live. As it's not long to go, I will leave this up, and from experience this should go live at 11.45pm tonight. I do NOT want another post on FF then saying "live now". Please, yes?

[deb1]

Saw this in Cineworld Glasgow with OH, Yinster and OH.

Whilst I do agree with a lot of the previous comments, there is no doubt that Mandela is one truly inspirational man who had a fascinating life and the Elba played the role well. However as far as the film itself I found it a too bit long and had many questions that I felt were unanswered when we left. Having said that I think that it will be an Oscar contender.
7/10 from me.

[karenlg123]

Saw this in Glasgow and whilst I thought it was a good enough film, I felt it was pretty superficial and didn't go into any great depth on a lot of things. No doubt Idris Elba played the part well, but neither myself or my father who came with me could relate to him as Mandela. He towered over all the other characters and yet Mandela was small in stature albeit with a large presence. I'm sure there must be other actors who would have been a better match for playing Mandela. If I wanted to watch anything to give me real info on this story, I have to say there were much better documentaries/programmes on the television this week. I think it would though be a good film to roll out to schools in the future for Moderns Studies or History classes as it would give an overall idea to those of an age who did not live through this and contains enough information in a watchable format for it to be watched and absorbed in a double period at high school.
7/10

[ladams888]

......No doubt Idris Elba played the part well, but neither myself or my father who came with me could relate to him as Mandela. He towered over all the other characters and yet Mandela was small in stature albeit with a large presence. .....

There are various (conflicting) statements about Mandela's height. It would appear that in his prime, he was taller than most Africans. Here is one quote, "...According to Long Walk to Freedom’s casting agent, Moonyeenn Lee, none can measure up to Mr Mandela’s 6ft 4ins (1.93 metres) frame. “I was free to cast a South African and I auditioned some extraordinary local actors,” Mrs Lee told South Africa’s City Press newspaper. “But the main problem is the height. Mandela is a particularly tall man. On average, South African actors are not 1.9m.”

And from Last week's Telegraph magazine, "Elba is 41 and as Mandela he uses prosthetic make-up to age 40 years. He plays the ‘bad boy’ in his 20s and 30s in sharp suits, and the dignified older statesman in batik shirts (the younger Mandela is played by Atandwa Kani). The physical resemblance is helped by Elba being tall (Mandela is 6ft 3in; Elba, 6ft 2in) and charismatic in his own right, and he manages to capture the essence of Mandela better than a more realistic incarnation might have been able to. "

[caitlinmorton]

I think if the statement about Mandela's height is true (I also had some issues with that) then maybe its more of a bulk issue. Idris Elba is bulky. The guy could easily be one of the most menacing bouncers you've ever seen. I don't get that from Mandela. Maybe the height was right, but not the body type.

I'll be watching this film again because of the Award nominations as obviously my mindset watching it before Mandela passed will be different than the voters now (I like to watch everything and make informed picks for Awards Season, its like my Super Bowl) so want to watch it again and see how I feel this time.

[raj101]

in the media I am so used to seeing Old Mandela, who probably lost a couple of inches after his 60s, that I thought of him at shorter than Elba.

I guess seeing a near prime muscle bound man trying to impersonate the gait of a 70something is never going to be accurate, theres way too much difference in the way their bodies are.

[rottyexpress]

Is the code 207094 for anybody or just for virgin customers?

[Yinster]

Is the code 207094 for anybody or just for virgin customers?

Not sure of the question as Virgin does their tickets booking by asking for their customer's virgin account and cross reference with their postcode. Also the code you posted is on a different website that Virgin customers do not use to get Virgin tickets. The code you posted is for anyone but probably more specific to those who are near the locations of the cinemas given.

[KM&M]

There is actually another screening of this at my local tomorrow, if I wasn't so tired after a busy week and the Sunday buses worked better with the show time I would so go and see it again.