Gandhi (1982)

Trailer

An eye for an eye only ends up making the whole world blind.
So basically: Mahatma Gandhi starts out as a naïve, but good-willed, young lawyer in South Africa. He is outraged when officials kick him off the train for refusing to give up his purchased seat in First Class. This incident starts his career as an activist as he fights for Indian rights in South Africa. Once the government recognizes rights for the his people, he returns back to his native India, where he finds the British government to be overbearing. Through a series of peace protests and outspoken activism, Britain relieves India of their control. Unfortunately, Gandhi's work is of yet unfinished as the Muslims and the Hindi people are at war with each other. The creation of Pakistan and Gandhi going on a hunger strike relieve this tension.

The first hour of this film was very interesting and I had hope for the rest of it - prior to that, I had remembered the movie being very long and not very enjoyable, and the fact that I don't like biopics anyway kind of put me off this film all together. I came out with the same reaction as I had on the first viewing - if not more so, as I had first seen it in class and it was broken up into several days of watching. It's much too long, as most biopics are, and I know that it would be hard to cut something out of the picture, but still. It felt long, which is what I do not like about it. Let me state here that one of my favourite films is Lawrence of Arabia so it is possible for me to like biopics, and long ones at that. Tho, Ben Kingsley's performance was very well done.

As much as I hate to say this, I don't think this deserves to be on the list.

Ziggi seal of disapproval!