In 1966 professional boxer Ruben ‘Hurricane’ Carter was
arrested for triple homicide and subsequently found guilty and sentenced to
three life sentences for the crime. Despite always maintaining his innocence a
second trial also came to the same guilty conclusion. Biopic The Hurricane tells the story of Carter’s
fight to clear his name with the help of some unlikely accomplices in the form
of three Canadians and the teenager from Brooklyn
who they’d taken in. Denzel Washington stars as Hurricane Carter in one of the
performances of his career in a film which portrays the hatred, racism and
injustice that the human race is unfortunately capable of dishing out to one of
its own.
The film uses a non linear timeline to flash back and
forward from Carter’s early years, through his boxing career, incarceration and
the eventual meeting between himself and Lesra Martin (Vicellous Reon Shannon),
Lisa Peters (Deborah Kara Unger), Sam Chaiton (Liev Schreiber) and Terry
Swinton (John Hannah) who all fought tirelessly to prove his innocence. The
bulk of the film concentrates on the period from Carter’s arrest in 1966 to the
mid 1980s though. Although it is far from a perfect film and inaccuracies have
been levelled towards it, the incredible story and Washington ’s performance make this a film
which I’d recommend to anyone.