AS someone who transcended greatness while creating history in his own lifetime, Nelson Mandela surely qualifies as an ideal candidate for a film biography. His death in December last year marked the end of an extraordinary life and in truth, so immense was his stature as a political figure and world leader that any movie about his life would have struggled to do justice to the man.

Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom is an ambitious project that took years to complete and is based on Mandela's 1994 autobiography of the same name, chronicling his formative years, early career and the 27 years he spent in prison before becoming President of South Africa. Despite the inspirational material at its disposal, the film - well made and watchable - doesn't have the same capacity as its subject to rise above the crowd and make a lasting impact.

Universally admired as a great man who fought for a just cause, Nelson Mandela was a lawyer-turned activist in apartheid-era South Africa. His place in the history books as a human rights campaigner and defiant symbol of the anti-apartheid movement is assured, so there was always a danger that Long Walk to Freedom, directed by Justin Chadwick and written by William Nicholson, could have been a 21/2 -hour long tribute piece. To its credit, the film tries to portray him as a flawed but driven human being, thrust by circumstances and a strong sense of righteousness into the glare of history.