the last king of scotland

This last weekend's rental DVD was the excellent The Last King of Scotland, starring Forest Whittaker.

I've almost not got much to say about this that isn't summed up by the praise that's already been heaped upon it. It's a very good film, based on what I'm guessing is probably a very good book.

There was one slight thing that niggled at me, though, and this is more of a general point than specifically about this film - it isn't real... but it is.

Basically, the main character in it (apart from Idi Amin) is entirely fictional - he's basically been inserted into the story to give it a narrative structure and to allow us viewers a way in. But because it's a film about this fictional character there's a distinct blurring between fact and reality.

This invented character is not some dispassionate observer, he's intimately locked up in a story with Amin and it's that story that we really follow - the fictional one. But we're also tracking along with real events. Things that actually happened are in the story too, but again, lines become blurred.

The problem with this is there's a part in it towards the end that's very shocking but that didn't actually happen. It was a malicious rumour that was there at the time, but the problem is that when you see it in the film it seems like it was real. But because the film is fictional it can put that stuff in.

I dunno if that makes much sense - what I'm getting at is that I'm a little uncomfortable with the whole blurring the lines of reality and fiction like that. And as I say, that's a general thing, rather than just specifically a problem with Last King.

Anyway, you can certainly see why Whittaker won an Oscar for his portrayal of Amin. It's a truly fascinating portrayal of a fascinating man.

Which is where the film really excels. Amin was clearly a monster, being responsible for the deaths of around 300,000 Ugandans (and it's not exactly a densely populated country) and yet that's not all we're shown.

He's not shown simply as some slavering psychotic, but instead as just a man (albeit a very charismatic one). And it's that which made him truly scary.