Last King of Scotland (Kevin Macdonald, 2006)

Discussions of specific films and franchises.
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Cinesimilitude
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#1 Post by Cinesimilitude » Wed Aug 09, 2006 1:09 am

Here's a trailer for Forest Whitaker's new film, in which he portrays general Idi Amin. Looks interesting, although I doubt it can affect viewers as well as the documentary.

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kinjitsu
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#2 Post by kinjitsu » Wed Sep 27, 2006 3:32 pm


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cdnchris
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#3 Post by cdnchris » Sat Sep 30, 2006 3:16 am

This one totally flew under my radar. The title obviously fooled me. This week I had come across an older article on Amin, which led me to watch the documentary again, and then while reading up on current releases today I see that this film is about Idi Amin Dada. Since it's caught me at the right moment I'm most definitely intrigued.

I see it's limited to LA and NY so I'll have to do some waiting. The trailer makes it look like a generic thriller, but I guess trailers are supposed to do that. Though it looks like Whitaker caught his personality. Anybody around here see it yet?

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#4 Post by cdnchris » Sat Oct 28, 2006 3:56 pm

Well, saw this a couple of weekends ago and have to say I enjoyed it for the most part. It sort of breaks down into a thriller near the end, where the McAvoy character knows he's in deep shit and has to get out of Uganda before Amin does him in. But it's still a fairly solid film (surprisingly energetic) with an excellent performance from Whitaker.

One thing I liked was how the atrocities were never actually shown (other than a couple sequences) but were hinted at, like the rumours that I'm sure were floating around during the time. This actually came off more dreadful than actually showing the things that were happening.

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Jun-Dai
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#5 Post by Jun-Dai » Sun Oct 29, 2006 1:16 pm

I dunno, I think showing the atrocities would have been pretty dreadful.

That said, I think the film was interesting for a number of reasons (including the characterizations of Nicholas Garrigan as someone who made grave lapses in judgement, though not entirely in obvious ways, and mostly they were presented as such in retrospect), but in the end it still felt like a Hollywood treatment, and it felt a bit too religious for my tastes (I just love how stoically Garrigan faces being hung by his skin).

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