Here is my second of five reviews for Alex who helped me decide on what movie series to tackle after I finished reviewing all of the Oscar Best Picture winners. – Thanks again Alex!
“If you’re afraid of dying it shows you have a life worth living. ” Nicholas Garrigan
Number of Times Seen – 2 (25 Feb 2007 and 31 Mar 2014)
Brief Synopsis – A young Scottish doctor trying to find himself ends up becoming the personal doctor of Idi Amin, the brutal dictator of Uganda during the 70’s.
My Take on it – Most people will watch this movie to see Forrest Whitaker in his Oscar winning performance as Idi Amin, but I personally think that James McAvoy is the better actor in this film.
Whitaker is good here, but I think he could have been much better. IMHO, he won the Oscar because the rest of the acting performances that year just weren’t as good, but it was a weak year. For the Oscar win, he beat Leonardo DiCaprio for Blood Diamond (2007), Will Smith for the Pursuit of Happyness (2006), Peter O’Toole for Venus (2007) and Ryan Gosling for Half Nelson (2007). None of these other performances were that great either and this is one of the most lackluster years for actor nominated performances.
If this movie wants to show the two-faced way that Amin led his regime, they should have shown us more of the brutality instead the viewer feels too distanced from what is happening in the country because it focuses on the “coming of age” story of McAvoy’s character and instead make Amin feel like a minor character.
For people who know some of the history of the story, this movie can be interesting at certain points, but in general, the movie is mediocre at best.
Bottom Line – Nice historical movie, but feels too distant and doesn’t make us connect with any of the characters or the situations.
Rating – BAFTA Worthy
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I quite liked the movie and also Forrest Whitaker’s performance.
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As I said, I think it was a very good performance and the best of the year, but still not amazing.
Thanks for stopping by and commenting Sapna!
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McAvoy and Whitaker are so great here that they make this movie so much more watchable. Good review.
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More watchable, but not iconic!
Thanks Dan
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I think this better than you do. But I agree that Amin was too much a back player to a character that didn’t even exist. And that McAvoy’s performance here is terrific. (Though I think Whitaker is pretty awesome, too.)
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Thanks Josh. I felt it was a strange way to do it if they wanted to spotlight his reign of terror.
Nice to see you back! Hope all is well
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Yeah. All is good. Just trying to refocus how I do this blog thing so I spend less time on it. That combined with a crazy week kept me away longer than I intended.
I do promise to always return and get more or less caught up, though.
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Yea, I follow waaay too many blogs and on top of that to write my own posts takes up more time that I should probably be spending on this 🙂
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Yup. And not only do I follow a lot of blogs, but I was trying to read every post from almost all of them. Just wasn’t sustainable. So I’m rethinking it, trying up to come up with a system that won’t burn me out.
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have the same problem. Let me know when you think of a solution. maybe I’ll adopt it also 🙂
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I definitely agree that McAvoy was the stronger actor here, I think it was a great film, but not the iconic success I think they were expecting it to be. Great review 🙂
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Thanks Alex,
Glad we can agree on this one!
Your other 3 reviews will be coming soon
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Never seen this, but sold on James McAvoy! I should check this out! Great review Rob!
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