The Last King of Scotland

 

First things first: the movie is not about the last king of Scotland :P . It is a fictional depiction of Uganda's President Idi Amin's rise to power and his dictatorial rule. The film tells a fictional story about his relations with his personal doctor. Dr. Nicholas Garrigan (James McAvoy), a Scotsman, who came to Uganda to work at a missionary clinic. He had an encounter with Idi Amin(Forest Whitaker), who enjoyed his company and later offers him the job of his personal doctor. Nicholas initially refuses but finally gives in.

Nicholas had seen the celebrations of the masses on Amin coming to power and formed a positive opinion of him. Amin tried to keep Nicholas happy by giving him undue credit and referring to him as his closest advisor. Gradually, things start to unfold and Amin's true colors are exposed. Finally, it gets too much for a doctor to handle all the atrocities happening around him and he shares his desire to go back to Scotland with his 'friend' Amin who doesn't allow him to do so. Next day, Nicholas gets his Ugandan passport! Nicholas, apart from his blind trust and ignorance, commits another grave mistake. Would he be able to bail out from this mistake? Would he be able to escape?

Forest Whittaker did an extraordinary job of enacting a military dictator and his moods, which are neither stable nor predictable and won 23 major awards including Best Actor at the Academy Awards, the Golden Globes, the Screen Actors Guild Awards and the BAFTAs. The story is gripping but a word of caution: it is not 100% historically accurate. Dr. Nicholas is a fictional character, though Idi Amin and the events around him are real.  So if you want to get a little deeper into the subject, you might want to do some research than blindly relying on the movie.

Now I come back to where I started. The movie has been titled so because Amin was known to adopt fanciful imperial titles for himself (source:Wikipedia). The movie is entertaining and a fair attempt to tell about one of the most brutal regimes in the world.


                                                               

Directed by	Kevin Macdonald
Produced by	Charles Steel Lisa Bryer Andrea Calderwood
Screenplay by	Jeremy Brock Peter Morgan
Based on	The Last King of Scotland by Giles Foden
Starring	Forest Whitaker James McAvoy Kerry Washington Simon McBurney Gillian Anderson

This movie is UDAY-Certified !!