A gripping thriller. McAvoy excels.

Rating: 8/10 (9 January 2008)

Although it drags at times and some of the scenes are just unintentionally laughable, The Last King of Scotland still manages to be a great blend of the tragedies created by dark political dictator, Idi Amin and the (fictional) adventure story of the young Scottish physician who realizes what's happening and escapes Idi Amin's terror to help bring peace to Uganda. When I first saw the film I put most of my focus onto Forest Whitaker's powerful performance that perfectly combines Amin's intense but horribly childish tantrums with his charismatic charm, but on this re-watch I found myself being more drawn towards James McAvoy's absolutely flawless portrayal of the naive Nicholas Garrigan who slowly realizes that the man he's become attached to is a monster. In my opinion, McAvoy upstages the Oscar-winning Whitaker and gives one of my favorite performances of 2006. The subplot featuring an affair between Garrigan and one of Amin's wives, played by Kerry Washington, felt pretty pointless aside from it being the reason why Amin strings Garrigan up by his skin near the end of the film instead of just shooting him (which is one of the most unnerving, painful to watch scenes I've come to witness). Overall it's a highly engaging story that shows the beauty of a country, the dark underbelly that a dictator can create and the incredible journey that one man takes to bring him down.