One of the films currently in production that I’m really looking forward to is The Last King of Scotland. The film is about former Dictator of Uganda Idi Amin and stars a massively underrated Forest Whitaker as the powerful political leader and former X-Files star Gillian Anderson.
However, one of the widely held views on Amin is that he was a Cannibal. The film is portraying this and the family of the late Amin are suing the producers for it:
The movie–which stars actor Forest Whitaker as the powerful political leader–centers around the height of Amin’s despotic rule, during which over 400,000 Ugandans were killed and the country’s entire Asian population expelled. Amin’s eldest son Taban Amin confirms the family is planning to sue for defamation for the dictator’s depiction eating human flesh, arguing they never granted permission for their father’s name or image to be used.
I have to admit my ignorance here. I’ve never really understood the legalities of portraying a person in a film without permission… be they hero or villain. Do you need permission from the family of a person to film a movie about them?
I also find the claims in the lawsuit rather comedic. They’re suing for defamation of character over cannibalism… but never mind about the 400,000 people that he murdered. It would be funny if it wasn’t so sad.
