Ryan ChartrandHe had many different names – “Big Daddy,” “The Butcher of Africa,” and “Lord of All the Beasts of the Earth and Fishes of the Sea” – but Ugandan President Idid Amin is best known as “murderer.”
Between 1971 and 1979, Amin was responsible for the brutal slaughtering of more than 300,000 Ugandan men, women and children. His reign over Uganda struck fear into the hearts of millions and caused a universal controversy.
Amin and his horrific legacy come to life in Fox Searchlight’s harrowing new drama “The Last King of Scotland.” It stars the sensational Forest Whitaker in the title role; a role that has earned the veteran actor both Golden Globe and Screen Actor’s Guild awards and an Oscar nomination.
Filmed completely on location in Uganda, the film recreates the on-goings of Amin political rule through the eyes of his young, Scottish doctor Nicholas Garrigan (James McAvoy) who travels to Uganda fresh out of medical school looking for adventure, romance and the joy of helping a people in need.
Garrigan begins his adventure working at a rural clinic alongside a British doctor and his wife (played by a blondified Gillian Anderson). But the good doctor’s sheer na’vet‚ gets the best of him during a chance encounter with the charismatic Amin, thus catipulting himself into the heart of Ugandan politics.
“At first, Garrigan is seduced by Amin’s famously charismatic personallity and ambitious plans for Uganda … As time goes on, seduced by his own desire for power, Garrigan becomes the dictator’s confidante, consultant and right-hand man, witnessing increasingly unsettling events – kidnappings, assassinations and unspeakable atrocities in which he himself may be complicit,” according to Fox Searchlight’s Web site, www.foxsearchlight. com/lastkingofscotland/.
Inspired by true events and people, the film manages to take an unbearable topic like genocide and transform it into a ground-breaking and soul-searching story about evil and the courage needed to overcome it.
Director Kevin Macdonald and writers Peter Morgan and Jeremy Brock weave an authentic tale that grabs audience members by the throats and pulls them into a world ripe with lies and the stench of death.
However, it is Whitaker’s portrayal of Amin that makes “The Last King of Scotland” what it is. The film could easily be ignored, or even demonized, due to the highly graphic nature of some of it’s scenes, but Whitaker’s ability to convey a combination of irresistible charm and jarring malice makes the character of Amin simutaneously lovable and detestable. Whitaker practically dares the audience to take their eyes off the screen as he plows through the country of Uganda, wreaking havoc on its people and economy.
The film’s only flaw, perhaps, is the way its creators chose to tell Amin’s terrible history. Much of the atrocities commited by the blood-thirsty tyrant are kept under wraps until late into the film; but it could be argued that the creators chose to do so purposefully with the intent of placing the audience inside the film. This tactic allows many audience members who aren’t aware of Amin’s countless crimes against his country to experience history as it unfolds before them.
And while this may make the film a little confusing, it also makes it all the more gut-wrenching and meaningful.