I Don't Mean to Be Invictus, er, Vindictive

Dear Clint Eastwood

Please don’t fuck us over. Truly, the ego of a nation is sweating in your palms.

I have long been a fan of your movies, both the ones you’ve acted in and directed. When I was growing up, you were The Man. No one threw a Hollywood punch like you, or managed to not look like a complete and utter dick despite having an orang-utan hanging off your neck.

In recent years you've turned more to directing, and have turned out some classics.

Now you are about to release Invictus – the story of how Nelson Mandela pulled South Africa together for the 1995 Rugby World Cup. How the love of the sport united the country, how they beat the odds and overcame the previously all-conquering All Blacks in the final to win the Webb Ellis Trophy for the first time.

I’m just going to detour here and explain a few things about the average New Zealander. We are relatively isolated and live on a small group of spectacularly beautiful islands that have pretty much been thrust into existence by tectonic plates. We like people from other countries, provided they like us in return. But the “like” is a default setting. We like everyone until they give us reason not to. And, oh my god, we have a sense of fair play. We strongly stand up for the underdog because, more often than not, the underdog is us. We’re kind of the little tough kid on the block who will stand up against the bully, just for the sake of it, and get a few solid blows in before he kicks the shit out of us.

Politically, we’ve gone toe-to-toe with the United States over all things nuclear, and France over their policy of nuking half the South Pacific just to see if their bombs worked. Militarily we’ve shipped off to the Crimean and Boer wars, First World War, Second World War (where Kiwi Charles Upham became the first combat soldier ever to earn the Victoria Cross and bar); we’ve had troops in Korea and Vietnam, and even sent our elite SAS to Afghanistan (where they had a 100% success rate on missions and earned a US Navy Presidential Unit Citation for “extraordinary heroism in action”).

So we’re a fiercely proud wee nation. And all we, and Aretha, are asking for is a little r-e-s-p-e-c-t. And if we don’t get it, that’s OK, too. Just please don’t be mean about it. Because pissed off Kiwis aren’t a pretty sight.

Which brings me back to Invictus. Rugby is almost a religion in New Zealand. It’s a great mix of politics and violence, and the All Blacks are the only team to have a winning record against all other countries.

South Africans, though, are almost as passionate about their rugby. In the 1995 Rugby World Cup the South African team beat the All Blacks. Well done. They did play well.

Now, New Zealanders all start muttering here. Because a couple of days before the final a handful of the Kiwi players snuck out of the hotel and went to McDonald’s for dinner. Now the irony does not escape us here; but these players woke up the next day all fit and feeling fine. The rest of the team, however, were all ill. Post-World Cup investigations revealed that what the rest of the rugby world was calling “sour grapes” was actually “poisoned coffee”.

The inability to provide clear and solid proof about this meant we, as a nation, just had to suck it up and move on. But it’s still a sensitive subject. Which is why I’m begging you, Mr Eastwood, to be tactful when dealing with this whole situation.

We’re trusting you to give the world a clear and accurate story. But you represent Hollywood. And Hollywood has a history of putting “based on a true story” at the start of a film and then just pulling the story and characters out its arse.

All we’re asking, Mr Eastwood, is please, please, please: Keep your arse closed and tell it like it was.