A fascinating blending of fiction with history

Rating: 8/10 (3 February 2007)

A young Scottish Doctor flees his repressive home to go to Uganda. Now that's an oxymoron if ever I've heard one! Once there he joins a mission and ministers to the locals. He tries to fit in to the Christian role but temptation has thrown him a curve. The missionary's wife is a blond tressed, and quite sumptuous Gillian Anderson - with a bang on British accent and demeanor. Unfortunately for him, and fortunately for my fantasy life, she hesitatingly demurs. At this point Idi Amin happens to be in the neighborhood and takes a fancy to our young Doctor (completely ignoring Gillian, which tells us right off the bat that the man's not normal), for having the chutzpah to brazenly use Amin's pistol to kill a cow, mortally wounded by Amin's limousine.
Our young naive, hedonist decides to take up Amin's offer to be his personal Doctor, and soon finds himself up to his elbows in African Alligators, namely your usual Dictatorial musical chairs.
The character of the young Scot is pure fiction, but in the Uganda of that day, a quite likely one. He slowly realizes that his boss is a sociopath, but he is also a prisoner, knowing that to displease him is a tad risky. Still he is a headstrong youth, and continues to confront Amin when he sees fit to. Then he steps over the edge and does something totally suicidal: he sleeps with one of Amin's wives.
The movie ends with the Entebbe hijacking of an Air France Plane full of Jews coming from Israel. Our hero uses the moment to escape - Uganda and certain death.
Whittaker is great. Playing sociopaths is every actors dream, as you get to be so mercurially evil, and he milks it for all it's worth. But he's never over the top, or campy, or unbelievable. He plays Amin as the jolly genocidal maniac that he was, and, thank God, keeps away from more than a nod at his being a Muslim. Whittaker will win the Oscar. I also predict that if they ever have a movie about Saddam Hussein, that actor will also win an Oscar