Stander (2004)

Thomas Janes Best

I had never heard of this movie but saw a program on Court TV about the real story of Andre Stander. I then found out that Thomas Jane had made a movie about it and thought I would check it out. This was a very good movie. I enjoyed it very much. Thomas Jane was excellent as was the rest of the cast. It is a very interesting story that is made even more interesting because it is true. It has political insight into the South African culture and also has a lot of action.

Check this movie out! November 5, 2006

Tom Jane does a superb job in this thrilling and crackling true story

Stander was a very good film about the real-life exploits of Andre Stander, Lee McCall and Allan Heyl who were known collectively as The Stander Gang. The Stander Gang was well-known for their daring and reckless bank robberies in their homeland of South Africa. The film stars Tom Jane (The Punisher, Deep Blue Sea) as the title character with Dexter Fletcher (Band of Brothers and Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels) and David Patrick O'Hara (Braveheart) rounding out the rest of the Stander Gang.

The film starts off introducing Andre Stander as a highly decorated member of the South African Police Force in the late 1970's and the beginning of the anti-apartheid movement. It shows Andre Stander's growing disgust and disenchantment in his government's racist apartheid policies and his own role in enforcing it. After a violent and brutal break-up of an anti-apartheid protest gathering where Stander kills a protestor, the film begins to move into meat of the story. Stander's disenchantment with the government causes him to commit bank robberis in audacious fashion as a way to rebel and defy the very state he has sworn to protect and serve.

The scenes where Stander commits these bank robberies were shot well and showed just how daring Andre Stander really was in his exploits. There's even a sequence where he returns to the scene of his most recent crime to investigate the robbery. A robbery he just committed just hours before during his lunchtime. These scenes and the later ones when he's joined by two other bank robbers shows Tom Jane at his finest. I think many would be hard-pressed not to think Jane's performance as a South African, accent and all, wasn't authentic. His charisma ruled throughout the film and was mostly evident through the many bank robbing sequences. He truly gave Andre Stander the air of a Robin Hood character who, despite his criminal acts, became a sort of folk antihero.

The second half of the film details the exploits of Stander after his incarceration for his bank robberies while a captain of the South African Police Force. It's here that we meet the rest of Stander's Gang as he recruits fellow inmate and outlaws Lee McCall and Allan Heyl. Even the way Stander engineers his escape from the work-prison he has been sent to shows his daring in thumbing his nose at the state and the police he used to be a part of. Dexter Fletcher was very good as the twitchy and less stable Lee McCall whose nerves begin to fray the bolder and bolder the gangs bank robberies become. David Patrick O'Hara was also good as the very professional bank robber Allan Heyl. Heyl didn't have the charisma that Stander had, but he was the rock which kept the robberies from spiraling out of their control. It was great to see O'Hara in another strong role. Some might recognize him as the scene-stealing Stephen, the Irish rebel who joins William Wallace's fight against the English during Mel Gibson's Braveheart.

The rest of the film was pretty much one bank robbery after the other with the Stander Gang always one step ahead of the police task force put together to capture them. In a twist of fate, the task force was headed by Stander's former friend in the police force Cor Van Deverter whose intimate knowledge of Stander's tactics and thought-processes helps in slowly closing the noose around the gang. There's abit of a repitition in the robberies and the getaways, but they serve an important purpose of slowly building up the Stander Gang's folkhero status amongst the population. It also showed the effect it had on some of the members of the gang. As popular and infamous the gang had become they were still outlaws who knew that sooner or later their luck would run out and they'd either be put back into prison or killed outright. For some it was the latter and for others the former.

Throughout the film, one could sense that some of the motivations behind Andre Stander's actions as a bank robber was to assuage his guilt over the sanctioned acts of brutality he had to perform to protect the apartheid government of his nation. The film and the story being told was almost a full-lenght film of Stander's attempt to make up for his past transgressions. And what better way to do this than use the system of the state against itself. He himself points out that a white man could get away with anything when most of the policemen in the city were called away to deal with an emergency regarding the black majority population. Stander realizes this to be true and his second career as a bank robber was born. The film only hints at him being a very good policeman, but the majority of the film shows just how much better he was as a criminal.

The film was expertly directed by Bronwen Hughes and as said earlier had strong performances from all the main leads in the film. The story rarely slowed down to the point that the story lost its direction. Every scene always led to the next part of the story being told until the very bitter end. Stander was a very good film anchored by a fine performance from Tom Jane. The film showed a brief glimpse into South Africa's apartheid past and how one individual's decision to defy the state led to a brief, but daring life of a modern-day Robin Hood. August 7, 2006

PROPAGANDA WOVEN INTO A TRUE CRIMES TALE

STANDER is another political message flick (yes, another!), the message being how oppressive and brutal was the Apartheid era. No, that is not the entire story. STANDER is also a superb action and adventure tale of a white cop who goes bad and starts robbing banks. The writer of STANDER would have us believe that Stander's turn to crime is due to guilt for his actions against a black man during a riot. That may be true but it also just may be true that Andre Stander, played wonderfully by Tom Jane, was just a crook and a rotten cop. Leave it to Hollywood to tell us again and again how evil whites are. Of course, some years after Apartheid came Rwanda where black Hutus slaughtered a million black Tutus in one year, maybe a 1000 times the lynchings in the US in one hundred years. Yet, in this movie, Stander is so burdered by guilt for his "misdeed" that he starts robbing banks. In light of Rwanda, this seems grotesquely silly but strangely redeeming. How many Hutus felt guilty for hacking their brothers to death, man, woman and child, with machetes purchased from China so that they didn't have to waste bullets? I recommend STANDER for the action, the photography and for the compelling "true" story. It is a decent film about a brazen, tough cop who went bad. But it is always useful to keep history in perspective when watching subtle propagranda woven into an adventure tale. March 26, 2006

Am I "Politically Correct" Yet?

After reading some glowing reviews of this movie, I made a point of seeing it. Was I disappointed!
Pompous, preachy, self-important, and--worst of all--really dull.

Despite being "based on a true story", it's a plot you've seen many times before, especially in Australian movies. (Think "Ned Kelly".) Especially when people start cheering Stander as a folk hero (for robbing banks?), I got a real sense of deja vu.

Don't waste your time, even if you're a big Thomas Jane fan--I am, and I still hated this movie. November 27, 2005

Deserves to be noticed, exciting and intriguing, based on true story

Based on a true story of a South African cop who has a change of heart after a bungled riot control operation, this film goes against many of the stereotypes of films based on "reality" but which are, in fact, highly fictionalized versions of the truth, with a bit of truth thrown in.

The story of Stander, former cop turned bank robber, stands apart because it is believable and generally compelling. You can't help but watch to find out how his story ends, what will happen and WHY he does what he does. The film doesn't reveal all but that is fine. Perhaps there weren't any absolute answers as to WHY Stander did what he did. Perhaps his behavior mystified him as much as anyone (the film hints at that).

I can see why this one didn't reach more people, as the accents can make it hard to understand some of the dialogue. There are also some slower parts that are necessary for understanding Stander but which viewers might find wearisome (I did not).

This is far above most of the "highly acclaimed" movies you'll find at the theatre or your local DVD/video/game store. It is well worth seeking out, especially if you like something with plenty of action and suspense but which is also a bit different. October 15, 2005

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