The Last King Of Scotland
Directed by Kevin Macdonald
by Vera Brozzoni
1971: young Scottish physician Nicholas Garrigan is bored, and decides to relocate to Uganda in order to help the population.
He makes big plans with colleague Sarah but soon, thanks to a banal accident, he finds himself entangled with populist dictator Idi Amin, who knights him his personal physician and closest advisor.
 Suddenly Garrigan is granted the benefits of a privileged position and forgets his humanitarian strives, but gradually senses that Amin’s regime floats on blood; after an easily avoidable fling with Amin’s third wife Kay ends up in horrible tragedy (the woman’s destiny is shown in a Freaks-like shot that stays in the memory for long), the doctor must beat it fast as he can, but Sarah does not forgive his incoherence, and his path is mined with danger.
There’s a key scene in the middle of the film: the camera circles around a skyscraper while a voice explains the urban renewal that central Entebbe is going to undergo during Amin’s dictatorship; from behind the skyscraper, Forest Whitaker’s enormous, ominous face appears, revealing that we are looking at a scale model of the building.
But the effect is also symbolic of the dictator’s absolute power over his country and is a perfect example of the actor’s ability to look friendly, childish but even more scary for this very reason; seeing him clad in a kilt (historically, Idi Amin seemed to see a parallel between Uganda and Scotland because both had fought and defeated Britain; hence his admiration for Scotland and his auto-nickname the film is entitled after) is one of the most uncanny sights of the last few months. This is also thanks to Whitaker’s impressive acting, that builds up a larger-than-life character, both physically and mentally.
Emotionally compelling and solidly written, this film is now seen as the foremost politically engaged work you can find on screen. Yet, its focus is not on history nor on the victims of Amin’s regime: not one scene is spent for them, and the public can never really understand what is happening outside the golden cage Garrigan has fallen into – which makes sense inasmuch the whole film is seen from Garrigan’s limited perspective.
Towards the end of the film, though, an array of heart-wrenching close ups and pans (the photography is made by Anthony Dod Mantle) shows the white French hostages who landed at the Entebbe airport after their plane has been hijacked by Palestinian terrorists: inevitably, we feel much more sympathy for them and for the equally white protagonist.
Weren’t this enough to make the political weight of this film lighter, even Garrigan’s personal change of mind is less ethically charged than it shows: tellingly, this vain and superficial womaniser decides to flee only when his private life crumbles and when he fears for his own life; there is no political consciousness dawning in him, but the selfish instinct to save his life, regardless of the mess Uganda is in.
Director Kevin Macdonald, who has documentaries like Touching The Void and A Brief History Of Errol Morris under his belt, has chosen a winning story for his debut fiction film: boasting excellent technical crew, script and actors, he has at least the merit of making the audience curious about Idi Amin. As for the real engaged cinema, it is more and more evident that the audience has to rely on documentaries to get some; and Macdonald knows even too well. |
|
|
More Films:
Blood Diamond
 Notes on a Scandal 
Perfume
The Notorious Bettie Page
The Black Dahlia
|
