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Riding something of a wave of similarly-themed dramas (or maybe a ripple), The Last King of Scotland is the latest film to look at Africa's recent troubled history. Other films in the trend include the generally praised Hotel Rwanda and The Constant Gardener, but for me, this is the best of the lot. The film is receiving awards attention for Forest Whitaker's eyecatching turn as former Ugandan dictator Idi Amin, which is certainly justified. Whitaker's performance is superb, expertly embodying both the strange likeability and scariness of the man. James McAvoy shouldn't be ignored, though, as he anchors the movie very effectively, managing to pull off a protagonist who at some points in the second act starts becoming an unappealing character. The film is the first fictional feature by Kevin "Touching the Void" MacDonald, and he brings his documentary-style approach to the film very successfully. Handheld camerawork is overused and can be annoying, but this film proves that in the right hands it's a worthwhile tool. The only slight flaw with the film is that I found its running time a little too long but the film was at no point slow paced at all, a fact that is in evidence right from the opening credits. In fact, it contains some of the most intense sequences I've seen in a long time.
The summary
The Last King of Scotland is not only a very well performed character study, it's also an exceptional thriller too.
