{"id":2317,"date":"2024-08-16T02:35:58","date_gmt":"2024-08-16T02:35:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=2317"},"modified":"2024-10-13T19:51:58","modified_gmt":"2024-10-13T23:51:58","slug":"amin-the-rise-and-fall","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/08\/16\/amin-the-rise-and-fall\/","title":{"rendered":"Amin: The Rise and Fall"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Amin: The Rise and Fall<\/strong> (1982)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 International Film Marketing\/Drama\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 95 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (strong graphic violence, gore, torture, sexual content including an attempted rape, brief nudity)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Sharad Patel\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Wade Huie\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Christopher Gunning\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Harvey Harrison\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: May 1982 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Joseph Olita, Thomas Baptiste, Leonard Trolley, Geoffrey Keen, Louis Mahoney, Andre Maranne, Denis Hills, Tony Sibbald, Norbert Okare, Ka Vundla.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: N\/A<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: *<\/p>\n

\u00a0When it comes to exploiting real-life tragedies for box office gain, the makers of Guyana: Cult of the Damned have a special spot in Hell reserved just for them. The fictionalized account of the 1978 tragedy that claimed over 900 lives is a sick, vile, depraved, nauseating pile of garbage that never should have seen the inside of theaters. Artistically and morally bankrupt, it\u2019s detestable on every single level known (and unknown) to man. It also presents something of a paradox. It\u2019s so terrible it has to be seen to be believed, but nobody should ever subject themselves to this abomination passing itself off as cinema. Okay, enough about that unpleasantness.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Contrary to what you might infer from the opening, this is actually a review of Amin: The Rise and Fall<\/strong>, sort of a docudrama\/exploitation hybrid dealing with the tyrannical reign of Ugandan dictator Idi Amin. To be honest, it\u2019s a weird one. It suffers from an identity crisis of sorts. It wants to be seen as a serious film, but it spends more time wallowing in blood than examining its subject with any real depth. It shows Amin, played by Kenyan actor Joseph Olita, as a larger-than-life figure who\u2019s both brute and buffoon. In many ways, he\u2019s a lot like depraved Roman emperor Caligula. To the movie\u2019s credit, it\u2019s not as sickening as the notorious 1979 biopic starring Malcolm McDowell.<\/p>\n

\u00a0As I recall, Amin: The Rise and Fall<\/strong> did pretty good business when it landed in theaters in spring \u201982. It wasn\u2019t good reviews that attracted audiences. Critics hated it, decrying the level of brutal violence depicted in the film. For many (me included), that seals the deal. I wanted to see it, but I knew what my parents\u2019 answer would be so I didn\u2019t even bother asking. What\u2019s funny is they had no problem letting me see Death Wish II around that same time. Funny how parents\u2019 minds work, isn\u2019t it? I finally saw it in \u201994 courtesy of Movies Unlimited. I felt a small sense of triumph at being able to cross it off my list of unseen movies.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I didn\u2019t really think of Amin: The Rise and Fall<\/strong> again until I came across it on YouTube. I thought it might be interesting to revisit it. As you all know, I just LOVE to write bad reviews of bad movies. That\u2019s where we run into a bit of a speed bump. I don\u2019t hate Amin: The Rise and Fall<\/strong>. I don\u2019t like it either. To be frank, I don\u2019t know how to react to it. It\u2019s not a question of it being a bad movie. It is a bad movie. Directed by Sharad Patel (his only directorial effort), it\u2019s cheap, poorly made and badly acted. Other than Amin, there\u2019s zero character development. Characters, like surgeon Dr. Oloya (Baptiste, The Wild Geese) and Amin\u2019s British aide (Trolley), pop up now and then to little avail. Others, like any of Amin\u2019s five wives, show up briefly before disappearing without serving any function. The narrative is disjointed. The actors re-enact major events like the Entebbe raid, the imprisonment of British journalist Denis Hills (playing himself) and the Uganda-Tanzania War that brought about the end of Amin\u2019s reign of terror in \u201979, but the film makes no attempt to tie them together cohesively. It\u2019s like reading an outline of a term paper on Amin. The score by Christopher Gunning consists mainly of dramatic notes before horrific acts of violence and music that sounds culled from a 70s cop show.<\/p>\n

\u00a0What ultimately saves Amin: The Rise and Fall<\/strong> from a zero-star rating is Olita whose performance as Amin is…. well, something else. It\u2019s convincing in that the actor does resemble the infamous dictator who insisted on being called \u201cIdi Amin Dada, Conqueror of the British Empire\u201d after the UK broke diplomatic relations with Uganda. He depicts Amin as a man of many different personalities, all of them out of control. That\u2019s a nice way of saying he\u2019s freaking insane! When Russian diplomats try to leave the country on his orders, Amin catches up with them at the airport to tell them he was just kidding. He begs them to stay before playing a tune on a concertina. Most of the time, he\u2019s ordering the deaths of people he sees as enemies. They die horribly. They\u2019re shot by firing squads or beaten and tortured by his men. Two guys are decapitated. Amin orders the corpse of one of his wives dismembered and shown to their children. One guy is burned to death in the trunk of his car. Bodies are thrown in mass graves or fed to crocodiles. One scene shows Amin cutting a piece of flesh from a body and consuming it.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Now comes the tricky part. Do I recommend Amin: The Rise and Fall<\/strong> or not? It\u2019s a bad movie, that\u2019s been established. However, I think it would be unfair to leave it at that. It\u2019s not that simple. For one thing, it has the guts to do what Guyana: Cult of the Damned didn\u2019t. It doesn\u2019t dramatize the situation. Real names and dates are used. That\u2019s a point in its favor albeit a small one. For another, it sincerely believes it\u2019s treating its subject with reverence. It\u2019s even dedicated to Amin\u2019s victims. Some would say it\u2019s a cheap move on the filmmaker\u2019s part, an insult to the memory of the nearly half a million innocent people that died under Amin\u2019s regime. Either way, it leaves a sour taste in the mouth.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I guess Amin: The Rise and Fall<\/strong> is best seen as a curiosity. It\u2019s exploitation filmmaking with serious intentions. It\u2019s rotten, but never boring. I can\u2019t recommend it, but I can\u2019t NOT recommend it either. It\u2019s one of those movies you have to see for yourself to believe.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Amin: The Rise and Fall (1982)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 International Film Marketing\/Drama\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 95 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (strong graphic violence, gore, torture, sexual content including an attempted rape, brief nudity)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Sharad Patel\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Wade Huie\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Christopher Gunning\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Harvey Harrison\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: May 1982 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Joseph Olita, Thomas Baptiste, Leonard Trolley, Geoffrey Keen, Louis Mahoney, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3318,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2317","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-weird-ones"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/Amin-The-Rise-and-Fall-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2317","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2317"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2317\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3319,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2317\/revisions\/3319"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3318"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2317"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2317"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2317"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}