--- title: "A Reasonable Man" year: 1999 kind: "film" canonical: "https://film.one/film/a-reasonable-man" fi1m_id: "a-reasonable-man" imdb_id: "tt0178860" tmdb_id: 158755 wikidata_id: "Q4659177" fi1m_score: 68 critics_reviews: 1 published: "2026-10-11T23:23:08.576297+00:00" updated: "2026-10-11T23:23:09.104205+00:00" region: "DK" licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # A Reasonable Man (1999) Directed by Gavin Hood · 1h 43m ## Identity A Reasonable Man - **Canonical:** https://film.one/film/a-reasonable-man - **Type:** Film - **Fi1m ID:** a-reasonable-man - **IMDb ID:** tt0178860 - **TMDB ID:** 158755 - **Wikidata ID:** Q4659177 - **Same entity:** https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0178860/, https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/158755, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q4659177 **Fi1m score: 68** · Critics: 1 of 6 reviews so far *In a sentence:* South African law meets a water spirit and Nigel Hawthorne has to referee > Gavin Hood writes, directs and stars in a courtroom drama that asks a hard question about law and belief and sticks with it for 103 minutes. It is modestly made and sometimes stiffly played, and it is still worth the evening. ## Synopsis Sean Raine (Gavin Hood) and his wife Jennifer (Janine Eser) are far from home when a young herd boy, Sipho Mbombela (Loyiso Gxwala), kills an infant. Sipho says the baby was a tikoloshe, an evil spirit, and that he did what anyone in the village would do. Sean takes the boy’s defence. In a provincial court, Judge Wendon (Nigel Hawthorne) presides, Prosecutor Linde (Vusi Kunene) presses for murder, and Sean sets out to argue that South African law’s reasonable man might reasonably believe in spirits. He calls a sangoma, Rachel Ndlovu (Nandi Nyembe), and an anthropologist, Professor MacKenzie (Graham Hopkins), and finds that the question he is asking the court is one he has not answered about himself. ## Review The film is built on a single legal question. South African law judges an act by what a reasonable man would have done, and Gavin Hood, writing and directing and casting himself as the defence lawyer Sean Raine, wants to know which man that is. A Zulu herd boy, Sipho Mbombela, kills a baby he believes to be a tikoloshe, an evil spirit, and the court has to decide whether a belief shared by his whole village counts as reason or madness. Hood does not pretend the question is easy, and for 103 minutes he does not let it go. That alone puts the film ahead of most courtroom dramas, which usually know the answer before the first witness is sworn. Nigel Hawthorne is the reason to see it. As Judge Wendon he sits above the argument with a patience that is not quite indulgence, and he lets us see a man who has spent a career applying one culture’s law to another culture’s people and knows exactly what that has cost. He does almost nothing: a glance over the glasses, a pause before a ruling, a dry question that cuts a lawyer’s speech in half. Every time the film threatens to become a lecture, he turns it back into a trial. Vusi Kunene, as Prosecutor Linde, gives him a worthy opponent, a black prosecutor who has no time for the idea that his people should be judged by a softer standard, and the film is honest enough to let him win several exchanges. Hood the actor is the weaker link in Hood the film. He plays Sean as a decent man with something on his mind, and he carries it mostly in his jaw. Janine Eser, as his wife Jennifer, is left to ask whether he is all right and to be told that he is. The film is more interested in Sipho than in either of them, and Loyiso Gxwala repays that interest with a performance of frightened stillness that does not ask for pity. The witnesses are where the writing comes alive. Nandi Nyembe plays the sangoma Rachel Ndlovu without a trace of the mystic, a working woman explaining her trade to people who have decided in advance not to understand it. Graham Hopkins, as the anthropologist Professor MacKenzie, delivers the academic case for cultural relativism and is made to look slightly foolish for it, which we took as Hood’s point. Ken Gampu’s Headman speaks for the village in two scenes and says more about the gap between the court and the kraal than any of the lawyers manage. Buster Reynolds shoots the countryside in flat, hard daylight, dust and dry grass and a sky with nothing in it, and the courtroom in brown wood and the glare of high windows, so that the two worlds never look like the same country. Avril Beukes cuts the trial cleanly and lets the longer speeches run, which is right. Neill Solomon’s score keeps to drums and voices and mostly stays out of the way until the end, when it does not. We will not describe how the trial resolves. We can say that Sean’s closing address, which the whole film has been building towards, held us completely, and that what held us was not the eloquence but the admission inside it. A lawyer stands up in a court he does not trust and tells it something about himself that he has told nobody else, and Hood, who cannot always act, can plainly write. We had been half-bored by the man for an hour; we were not bored then. Against the genre’s own standards this is a small film that does something the large ones rarely attempt, which is to let the legal question be the drama rather than a frame around it. The reviews so far have been kind, and we are inclined to agree with them, with the caveat that the production is plain, the hero is stiff and the first half asks you to wait. Wait. The trial is worth it, and Hawthorne is worth it twice. *Fi1m score 68, published 11 October 2026.* ## Straight answers **Is A Reasonable Man worth watching?** *A Reasonable Man* is worth an evening for anyone who likes a courtroom drama that takes its legal question seriously, and we scored it 68. Gavin Hood's own performance is stiff and the first half asks you to wait, but Nigel Hawthorne's judge and the witnesses are worth the patience. The closing address repays it. **How long is A Reasonable Man, and what is it rated?** *A Reasonable Man* runs 1h 43m. **Where can I watch A Reasonable Man in Denmark?** *A Reasonable Man* is not on any streaming or rental service in Denmark at the moment. It is available in 1 other country; change your country at the top of the page to see where. Availability is checked daily. **How does A Reasonable Man compare to Anatomy of a Murder?** *A Reasonable Man* is the smaller and more earnest of the two films, and [*Anatomy of a Murder*](https://film.one/film/anatomy-of-a-murder) is the better one. Preminger treats the trial as a game and watches how it is played; Hood treats it as a question about law and belief and refuses to let go of it. Choose Preminger for craft and a lawyer worth watching, Hood for an argument you will not have seen before. **What should I watch after A Reasonable Man?** After *A Reasonable Man*, try [*Anatomy of a Murder*](https://film.one/film/anatomy-of-a-murder) (1959, Fi1m 87): The best film about a trial as a game, and how little truth has to do with it. Then [*Timbuktu*](https://film.one/film/timbuktu) (2014, Fi1m 88): Law imposed on a village that has its own, told with more anger and more grace. ### Reviews we read (1) - **Variety**, Derek Elley (70/100, inferred): Elley finds it an unusually thoughtful and edifying courtroom drama that avoids many familiar clichés, though modest production values limit its prospects. He singles out Sean’s climactic courtroom speech for turning complex questions of law and belief into compelling cinema. [Read](https://variety.com/1999/film/reviews/a-reasonable-man-1117752079/) ## Details - **Director:** Gavin Hood - **Director:** Gavin Hood - **Writer:** Gavin Hood - **Cinematography:** Buster Reynolds - **Editor:** Avril Beukes - **Music:** Neill Solomon - **Cast:** Gavin Hood as Sean Raine; Nigel Hawthorne as Judge Wendon; Janine Eser as Jennifer Raine; Vusi Kunene as Prosecutor Linde; Ken Gampu as Headman; Loyiso Gxwala as Sipho Mbombela; Nandi Nyembe as Sangoma Rachel Ndlovu; Ian Roberts as Chris Van Rooyen - **Runtime:** 1h 43m - **First release (South Africa):** 13 August 1999 ## Where to watch in Denmark Not streaming, renting or buying in Denmark at the last check. Also available in: US. Add `?region=XX` to this URL for another country. ## If you liked this - *Tsotsi* (2005): Hood again, with a township thief, a stolen car and a baby; harder and better. - *A Dry White Season* (1989): A South African courtroom under apartheid, with Marlon Brando enjoying himself as the barrister. - *Anatomy of a Murder* (1959), Fi1m 87: The best film about a trial as a game, and how little truth has to do with it. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/anatomy-of-a-murder.md) - *Ten Canoes* (2006): An Aboriginal story told on its own terms, with its own law and its own jokes. - *Timbuktu* (2014), Fi1m 88: Law imposed on a village that has its own, told with more anger and more grace. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/timbuktu.md) --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/film/a-reasonable-man