Eye Candy #240 - "The Last King of Scotland"

The Last King of Scotland:  One of those fun, heart-warming films that show us exactly how wildly the pendulum swung for the worst in some parts of post-colonial Africa.  Dr. Nicholas Garrigan (played by James McAvoy) is a young Scottish doctor who moves to Uganda in search of a life a little less ordinary.  A chance encounter with Ugandan leader Idi Amin (played by Forest Whittaker, who won the Oscar for his role), and Garrigan finds himself in Amin’s inner circle, as his private physician and sole White advisor, and privy to the inner workings of Amin’s regime.  However, over time, Garrigan becomes disillusioned by both what he sees and is told about the state of the country.  As Amin is vetting him with fancy cars and exotic young women, Garrigan also sees Amin making opponents disappear permanently at an alarming rate.   However, once he realizes this, he’s in far too deep to just walk away.  It also doesn’t help that Amin won’t let him leave.  Garrigan is based loosely on Bob Astle, a real advisor to Amin during his reign in Uganda from 1971 to 1979 (Astle was involved in the country’s security apparatus, unlike Garrigan).  What Amin was and was not capable of has never been proven one way of the other (including charges of cannibalism, conferring with the decapitated heads of rivals during dinner, that sort of even-keel thing), and the film steers away from most of it with the exception of one particularly unnerving dismemberment.   Well made all around, though it begins rather slowly.   The lead performances are solid, though Garrigan’s naivete is the kind that makes me want to slap people in the jaw when they claim “I didn’t really know what was going on.“  He seems almost too good to be true.  Also, at some points, the film feels like one of those psycho ‘best friend’ thrillers like “Single White Female”.  Watch this with “Hotel Rwanda” and you’ll be thoroughly depressed.  Woodchuck sez, “Check it out.”