Catch a Fire (PG)

Phillip Noyce has recently moved from directing effective but forgetful Hollywood thrillers such as Patriot Games (1992), sequel Clear and Present Danger (1994), and the lamentable The Saint (1997) to become something of a respected niche director for the politically driven docudrama. Rabbit Proof Fence (2002) and The Quiet American (2002) were both compelling character driven studies that used the individual stories to highlight more widespread issues. Government policies that led to the servitude of young Aboriginal girls in the 1930s manifested in the form of three youngsters escaping their captors in Rabbit, and American was a Saigon love story amidst the carnage of the Vietnamese war. It’s disappointing then that Catch a Fire does little more than occasionally spark and bears more resemblance to the bog standard thriller of Noyce’s aforementioned back catalogue.

Derek Luke (last seen excelling in Denzel Washington’s directorial debut Antwone Fisher) is Patrick Chamuso; a foreman at a coal-to-oil refinery in Secunda who operates below the radar in his apartheid torn life. He reports to the white management, will castigate his fellow black employees for stepping out of line on the job, and coaches the local soccer team. He does this to get by. It’s his form of survival. When the refinery is sabotaged by terrorists Tim Robbins' local police chief cum family man Nic Vos is forced to take drastic measures to obtain a confession from the obviously innocent Chamuso that will change the paths of their lives forever.

Catch a Fire is ironically a very cold film. The themes resonate and elicit empathy even though the characters do not, mainly because Apartheid ended as recently as 1991 and the issues are still relevant today even if they are found at different places on the global map. But, as a medium, cinema requires our involvement in the story and the characters are just not very interesting. Derek Luke gives an exemplary performance as the films protagonist and it is refreshing to see a movie about apartheid that isn’t viewed through the eyes of a white character (read Kevin Kline in Cry Freedom or Stephen Dorff in The Power of One). The supporting cast do not fare so well, primarily Tim Robbins as a morally unbalanced cop who comes across as the least intimidating torturer in history.

The lazy script doesn’t help matters though, which is a surprise considering the source. Writer Shawn Slovo is the son of Joe Slovo, the late leader of the African National Congress, who is featured in the film. The fluidity and believability of the movie relies too heavily on ridiculous decisions – Why doesn’t Chamuso just confess as to where he was on the night of the attack on the factory? For such a level headed character we are offered little or no reasoning beyond the fact that he doesn’t want his mistress to be discovered. This is surely a small price to pay to avoid the torture that follows? Slovo also fails to deliver on a promising set-up that quickly makes way for a haphazard and rushed feel to the second half of the film.
Ultimately Noyce has created a film that would have served better as a documentary (the real Patrick Chamuso appears in footage towards the end of the film) and doesn’t back-up the thematic promises that the subject matter might suggest. A brilliant central performance from Luke aside, this is an uninspired, blandly directed disappointment.