Stander

Stander (2003)

Runtime: 111 minutes

Directed by: Bronwen Hughes

Starring: Thomas Jane, David O'Hara, Dexter Fletcher, Ashley Taylor, Deborah Kara Unger

From: Several different foreign entities

Or: when passive-aggressive behavior leads me to watching a film: 

This is another movie viewing that came about after a messageboard discussion; in this case it was someone bringing up a movie discussed before and miffed that seemingly no one else has seen it. As it is on Amazon Prime Video I figured a film which sounds like something I'd enjoy anyway should be viewed. I was correct, and I laughed at the real life scenario of a police officer investigating the bank robbery that he himself earlier committed.

It is “based on a true story” (looking it up afterwards, some things shown were true while others, not so much so; it also sanitized him... he allegedly sexually assaulted a woman and that was never covered) of how South African police officer Andre Stander-Thomas Jane-decides to rob banks with some people during the late 70's into the early 80's. The movie portrays his reasoning for doing so, which is him becoming disillusioned with Apartheid and how he had to shoot and kill some people during in Thembisa during the Soweto Uprising of 1976; that was due to Afrikaans being installed as the official language to be taught in schools. Naturally the black people were not happy as they thought their natural languages would be eradicated. They were fired upon after rocks were thrown... only after tear gas was fired upon them. Yeah, it uncomfortably reminded of the riots that have happened in recent United States cities like Ferguson and Baltimore. It was pretty chilling, especially knowing it really occurred. I have heard that Stander may not have actually be there for the incident and his bank-robbing escapades could be not so noble and instead he was just a bored dude who wanted more excitement in his life.

Regardless, as I mentioned the movie is not always accurate to what actually occurred; Stander's final fate as shown in the movie is mild compared to what actually happened, although that would have taken longer to set up and show than what the film did. As that's standard for bio-pics and the movie isn't completely filled with rubbish, I can't get all fired up about it, although as typical I imagine that books, news articles and the like are more exciting to read and are more informative anyhow. Judging the movie on its own merits, it's pretty good. The cast as a whole does a nice job, even if many of the main players actually aren't South African and I imagine some don't find that to be ideal. Thomas Jane-in the first half sporting a sweet 70's mustache-delivered the best performance as the lead; I am not sure why he did not become a bigger star, as with his talent I feel he should have had a career filled with more roles in high-profile motion pictures.

As you'd expect from a movie set in this time period, there are groovy clothes and cool old cars (such as a yellow Porsche 911 Targa) and I am typically down for such things. The score was usually pretty jazzy-funky and it fit the setting; the South African scenery usually looked pretty nice. While Andre Stander may not have quite been the noble anti-hero as portrayed here and he was enigmatic, his exploits were charming to many people in the country and I am not surprised such a tale would be made into a movie. It is a shame that woman director Bronwen Hughes hasn't done any theatrical movies since, only doing TV shows and TV movies. She probably deserves better in the same way that Thomas Jane deserved better with his career.