The
travails of Rubin 'Hurricane' Carter,
the boxer who spent years in jail convicted
of a murder that he did not commit, have
already been immortalised in song and
book, so perhaps it was inevitable that
the story would come to the screen sooner
or later.
"Rubin
and I talked a lot and I took a lot of notes,"
says Denzel Washington, who plays Carter
in Norman Jewison's The Hurricane.
"He went through pots and pots of coffee
and packs of cigarettes. I'd drink a little
coffee. It's interesting and challenging
when the person is there, alive and in the
room."
The
Hurricane tells the tale of Carter's
boxing career, his arrest and his long
fight for freedom. Various celebrities
and well-known figures jumped on the Carter
bandwagon, so the general outline of his
journey is familiar to many. A recent
article in The New York Times, however,
took the movie to task for toying with
many of the facts, not necessarily a reason
for avoiding the picture if vicarious
emotional experience is your priority.
"This is a movie," Washington says
in defence of the factual changes. "We
have two hours. Obviously we leap and
jump and combine characters."
Jorn
Rossing Jensen
by
Norman
Jewison