Movie Review: Hansie

Hansie’s not perfect

Hansie is a disappointing movie for a number of reasons. Bertha’s accent, the odd casting of Ali Bacher and the fact that Hansie is…well…irreplaceable. I recently read Garth King’s book and was disappointed that some of the subtler details (like the controversial handover of captaincy from Kepler to Hansie) aren’t in the movie. So is Hansie a waste of our precious time? Absolutely not.

What Frans Cronje – producer, and Hansie’s brother – has done is step very far away from the subject matter and then gradually, bring the lense closer and closer to his brother in what becomes a very touching, and ultimately, very sad story. Hansie is about winning, losing and winning again.

The movie opens with crisp white text on an oil black canvas. Not long ago, when South Africa had just become a democracy, the country was looking for new heroes. And indeed, Hansie, a boy from the school Grey College, answered that call.

I was at school with Hansie at the time, and I remember how the country was changing. How sport was changing. Although Hansie was a phenomenal cricketer at school, I didn’t pay much attention to cricket or have close to the love for cricket that he did – very few South Africans supported cricket in those years of isolation. There was no such thing as a South African cricket team in those days. This was a time when South Africans knew nothing about Benson&Hedges Day/Night matches. And yet Hansie dreamed of being in it, being the captain.

At a time when South Africa was about to be extended an open invitation, in all spheres, back onto the international arena, big dreamers like Hansie were as rare as hen’s teeth.

But Hansie did dream big. As a schoolboy, at 5 ‘0 clock in the morning, Hansie and his schoolboy teammates, would run from the school to Naval Hill and back. They did this every day, for the full year, in a concerted effort to be the fittest and best school’s team. This sort of hardy iron-willed gutsy ambition stood the Vrystaat boerseun in good stead ever since. There was never anything wrong with Hansie’s ability to back up big dreams with a hard as nails work ethic.

When Hansie became the captain of the South African team, he brought this discipline with him, instilled it in the players, but remained the fittest and most committed players, rivaled only by the likes of Jonty Rhodes, someone who became one of Hansie’s best friends.

A memorable scene in the flick is a pep talk by Bob Woolmer, who has just assumed the job of coaching the team. Woolmer, well played by Nick Lorentz says, “You can do 1 thing 100% better, but you achieve far more doing 100 things 1% better.” He also says: “One run can make a difference.”

The sport scenes in the movies are superb. No, they can’t really compare with the white knuckled suspense or reality of the real matches, but they certainly take you back. The famous 1994 encounter between Hansie and Warne (sporting those white lips) is brought in bright technicolor to the silver screen, so too that famous semi-final at Edgbaston where Allan Donald failed to get a final run for victory. [One run did make the difference]. You can see the movie makers know their cricket - Klusener’s determined flick-back batting style is purposefully rendered in this scene.

Frank Rautenbach does a fair if slightly chunky version of Hansie. South African audiences will more than likely identify more with him as a fellow South African than as Hansie in particular. That said, there are certainly glimpses of Hansie in Frank. In the smile, the demeanour, and particularly behind the bat. Brandon Auret does well as Frans Cronje, and Alistair Moulton-Black is a chip off the young Jonty. David Sherwood does a credibly preachy but somewhat softened Peter Pollock and David Minnaar brings appropriate reserve and distinction to the important role of the Grey Principal, and Hansie’s mentor, Johan Volksteedt. Minnaar’s accent in particular, is perfect. Bertha’s accent irks, but then due to funding arrangements from America, they wanted at least one American actress represented in the cast. Frans told me they wanted the entire cast to be coherent to overseas audiences, hence the near total absence of Bloemfontein accents.

All the scenes featuring Grey College boys work phenomenally well. I might be biased, but I felt my blood boil and juices start to race when they sang their songs of support for their ex-headboy. The footage of Grey captures a lot of the powerful emotional truth that Cronje, through this flick, seeks to share with the world. The soundtrack is good, although one quibble: where the crickers are in a montage of newspapers and videos (the sort of thing you see in a Rocky movie) you need a much deeper, louder and more powerful DOOF DOOF from the bass to capture the power, passion and adrenalin.

There is a point in the Hansie flick where what happened to Hansie begins to address our own struggles in life – whether it be against depression, or defeat, or a lack of belief either in ourselves or what we perceive in others. It’s an incredibly dispiriting feeling, especially when you’ve had it all at your feet.

There is also a point where the audience, who is drawn almost reluctantly into so many corridors of the story, begins to float ahead near the end, unencumbered by fear or resentment. I felt tremendous compassion for Hansie. A lot of the hardcore reviewers in the audience were in tears at the end, and I was close to them myself.

I’m not sure if it is possible to make the perfect biopic. This Frans Cronje/Rigardt van den Berg movie ultimately works because, after all, it is quintessentially a South African story about a mythical white boy from Bloemfontein.

Hansie may not be perfect, but this movie certainly deserves both our attention, and our support. Stay seated when the credits roll. The best part is the raw footage of Hansie swimming with a dolphin to Joe Niemand’s beautiful song, Cry Freedom.

Hansie opens September 24 at cinemas nationwide. This is the day before what would have been Hansie's 39th birthday.

NVDL: My interview with Frans Cronje is published in the Sunday Independent on the 21st of September. The article is titled Hansie deserves our support. You can read it here.