an intellectually engaging experience, with a moving central performance at the center

Rating: 8/10 (29 September 2015)

With Mahatma Mohandas K Gandhi, a man who, in some ways, transformed how non-violent resistance has been practiced in the world for 100 years (basically in the modern era, and MLK was one of his big fans), it's hard to find someone to fill those shoes (or that white outfit he wore from a certain point till he died). Ben Kingsley is that man, and it's so magnetic a performance, so filled with empathy - or rather, he makes this man such a life-force of good, or always trying to be, or being stubborn in the face of insurmountable odds - he IS Gandhi, in a manner of speaking. All the more remarkable that, despite being from India, he is not of that skin color. Does it matter? Talent, heart, actual filling in a role to a point where color no longer matters, it's the kind of thing that helps to transcend the possibilities in movie acting.
That may sound of high praise, though this is a good movie. Maybe not great, and I'll get to why for myself personally in a moment. What is impressive is that director Richard Attenborough engages the audience on a massive scale - this story takes place over a period of 50 years (it also starts at the end, with the assassination of the man in 1948). We see how he was put through racial discrimination and battery at the hands of British imperial forces in South Africa, and started off with his non-violent path of resistance all due to fingerprinting for citizens of India. Then of course it's just a matter of time from little rights like that to making the "Alien" presence of the British go away. That of course is less easier said and even harder done.
It's a struggle that takes place over decades and involves in large part Gandhi winning over an entire nation, piece by piece, speech by speech (at times like that opening act at a rock concert that people don't expect much of, and then wipes everyone else away with what he has to say), and appealing to the better angels of the nature of people. The idea is simple: show the barbarism and problems of the way that Imperial rule is done, and don't fight back. We see these historical events unfold, and Gandhi, via Kingsley, has to come in as a voice that is not always seen as reasonable. When some Indians on a protest march fight back against some soldiers and then kill a couple of them in a vengeful rage, Gandhi insists everyone, all over, stop the run-up to get things moving in the fight against the British. And, Gandhi being Gandhi, he hunger strikes until all marching for freedom stops (momentarily). It won't be the last time, either.
There's a lot of rich historical moments going on in the film, and a lot of is engaging just on a historical-intellectual level; in a sense it's a good brother/cousin film to Lawrence of Arabia, also about a man's attempt (kind of successful really) at changing how literally the lines of the map are drawn in a part of the world, and what happens when those very people have to forge new identities. In Arabia it was the cutting-up of countries into what we see today as the Middle East, and in Gandhi it's India and Pakistan. There's intense conflict to mine here, and we see a lot of turmoil in the second half of the film on this level. I also found it remarkable, and the scene itself heartbreaking, that the film's first half ends right at the Intermission point of a gigantic tragedy: the slaughter of over a thousand Indian people by British Colonialists (many women and children). Normally the first half of a film will end on a high note (just the year before in Reds it's at the point where Russia gets its revolution and lovers reunite for good, for example). Here, it's somber, and it sets up the tremendous stakes in the second half for this man.
What didn't totally connect with me though were those parts around Gandhi, on an emotional level. Kingsley is so good here, and there's a decent performance usually around the corner (Martin Sheen, Candace Bergen), but I wish there was just a little more about the man himself, on a personal level, than we see here. Sure, there is a really intense moment early on where Gandhi and his wife get into an argument - he almost throws her out of the house until she yells sense into him and he realizes what he's doing - and while I naturally didn't expect more of that, I was hoping to see just a little more of Gandhi as the man, on a personal level, than just as his cultural accomplishments. This is not to decry the film too much, but it just lacked a certain something to the pathos overall that kept it from being great.
Of course there's exceptions to this - a scene where a hunger-stricken (near death really) Mahatma has to tell a man who thinks he's going to hell for killing someone what to do is awe-inspiring, especially how Kingsley is on such a low-energy level - but it's really about the sweep and scope of this story that makes Gandhi the film it is. If that's fine for you, have at it. Those looking to see the many flaws that have been pointed out about the man in certain history books (or in the negative/less satisfied comments on IMDb) may not get that. It's a big Oscar-winning biopic, and it does what it does - thankfully there's a performance at the center that is truly great and spectacular, and often for how Kingsley isn't giving big, manic speeches. He's often just talking softly, calmly in a meeting or a courtroom or starving, and it's just... wow.