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In My Country (2005)
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Reviews Counted:80
Fresh:18
Rotten:62
Average Rating:4.8/10
Consensus: A well-intentioned but melodramatic look at post-Apartheid South Africa.
Runtime: 1 hr 44 mins
Genre: Dramas
Synopsis: Langston Whitfield (Samuel L. Jackson) is a Washington Post journalist. His editor provocatively sends him to South Africa to cover the Truth and Reconciliation Commission hearings, in which the... Langston Whitfield (Samuel L. Jackson) is a Washington Post journalist. His editor provocatively sends him to South Africa to cover the Truth and Reconciliation Commission hearings, in which the perpetrators of murder and torture on both sides during the Apartheid era are invited to come forward and confront their victims. By telling the unvarnished truth and expressing contrition, they may be granted amnesty. Can the deep wounds of Apartheid be healed through reconciliation? Langston is deeply sceptical. He tracks down Col. De Jager, the most notorious torturer in the SA Police and tries to penetrate the mind of a monster, an experience that obliges him to confront his own demons. Anna Malan (Juliette Binoche), is an Afrikaans poet who is covering the hearings for radio. As a white South African she is shattered by the accounts of the cruelty and depravity committed by her fellow countrymen. Anna and Langston must both question their sense of identity. Where do they each belong? How responsible are they for what is done in the name of their respective countries? The moving testimony of the victims affects them deeply. In different ways they are both estranged from their families, and their shared experience draws them ever closer to each other. It is a story charting the unfathomable depths of human cruelty and the redeeming power of forgiveness and love. -- © Sony Pictures Classics [More]
Starring: Juliette Binoche, Samuel L. Jackson, Brendan Gleeson, Menzi "Ngubs" Ngubane
Starring: Juliette Binoche, Samuel L. Jackson, Brendan Gleeson, Menzi "Ngubs" Ngubane
Director: John Boorman
Director: John Boorman
Screenwriter: Ann Peacock
Producer: Robert Chartoff, Mike Medavoy, Kieran Corrigan
Studio: Sony Pictures Classics
Reviews for In My Country
The actors can handle the heavy lifting, but this doesn't give you much more than a well-done cable documentary.
The script...intelligently explores...the profound need to make sense out of madness and to find emotional peace in its aftermath...Sustains a deep and moving involvement.
See In My Country anyway, because it's doubtful we'll get another movie too soon that raises the issue of vengeance versus forgiveness -- and endorses the latter in the name of a nation's spiritual well-being.
Boorman treats this moving, important subject with restraint, tact, and candid views of horrors suffered by the nation.
Intelligent piece that does its job as entertainment. More importantly, it should advance public knowledge about the apartheid government's human rights violations.
Offers a rounded and revealing story of the radical experiment in restorative justice in South Africa following the downfall of apartheid.
An effective dramatization of the Truth and Reconciliation hearings in South Africa in 1996.
Important for what it teaches about revenge, justice and forgiveness. But you'll have to ignore the goofiness.
It's essential viewing for anyone interested in the state of post-Apartheid South Africa.
The charisma and hard work by his two leads allows Boorman to succeed beyond all expectations.
Worth seeing for many reasons, including for the obvious educational aspects.
[E]xhaustingly heartbreaking... An unforgettable film about justice...
A stirring, large-souled movie about an event that was both an exposure of horror and a celebration of forgiveness.
A direção de Boorman e o roteiro deixam muito a desejar, muitas vezes apostando num maniqueísmo desnecessário. Porém, o filme tem coração e alma – e isto faz a diferença.
Need[s] to be seen, as essential history and as demonstration of a form of social reckoning where compassion triumphs over passion, and the olive branch over the gun.
...the foxhole relationship that develops between Anna and Langston is completely natural -- up until the point where they fall into bed together.
A series of brief, appallingly simplistic vignettes that, rather than conveying the depth and complexity of South Africa's history and culture, distill it to the point of distortion.
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