(Credits: Far Out / YouTube Still)
Tue 30 December 2025 20:45, UK
Sometimes our favourite movies are those that also disturb us the most. And for Kristen Bell, one film took her to an extremely dark place, and that’s why it made it to her top five favourites.
Among lighthearted classics like The Apartment, When Harry Met Sally, National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, and Fletch on Bell’s list is the dark historical drama The Last King of Scotland. It seems a little out of place, but then again, we all need balance in our lives.
“I really like The Last King of Scotland, if I’m in a dramatic mood, because it was so furiously disturbing,” she explained to Rotten Tomatoes. And she’s not wrong, the 2006 film is a fictional exploration of the real-life dictatorship of Uganda President Idi Amin, so it’s hardly going to be lighthearted like a Chevy Chase romp.
The Nobody Wants This actor claimed that she liked the movie despite not loving the subject matter, “It’s not a subject I crave, ‘cause it scares me so much. I was put into a real dark place after that movie.” It’s obvious from her other favourites that heavy subjects aren’t her cup of tea, but I seriously doubt many people “crave” the subjects of brutal dictatorships, genocides and despotism.
Most people are going to come away from a film like this in a pretty die place as it does little to rouse hope for humanity, but depending on how you view this film, you might actually come away feeling even darker than usual, giving its handling of the subject matter.
Look, it’s no Zero Dark Thirty, and it might have been highly critically acclaimed at the time, rightly winning Forest Whitaker the Academy Award for ‘Best Actor’, but it’s not the best portrayal of the complex political situation in Uganda at the time, and mostly glaringly obvious and what should leave viewers in a dark place, is the film’s centring of a fictional white Scottish doctor – played by James McAvoy – in a story about Uganda.
Turn after turn, Dr Garrigan’s fictional pain and fear is the motivating force of the film, not the real lives, pains and fears of the Ugandan people, who should be at the centre of the movie, and it is so utterly strange to take a historical moment in time and attempt to tell a realistic story about it through an entirely fictional character.
It is as though the author of the book and the director of the film decided that the only way to make a story about a country in Africa relevant was through the lens of a white Westerner, and it’s hardly uncommon, unfortunately, with projects like The Last Samurai and The Great Wall springing to mind, but with the incredibly heavy themes of this movie, it seems even more egregious than usual.
The Last King of Scotland manages to exoticise, infantilise and silence the country it is trying to historicise, but that’s what happens when we try to tell a true, political story through a fictional lens, and sure, there are movies like Inglorious Basterds that take a historical moment and fictionalise it, but so rarely do they take such a serious tone. Historical fiction is one thing. Whitewashing is another.
The story of Idi Amin is one that is ripe for exploration without shoehorning in the plight of the white man in Africa. It’s so ripe for exploration that Mahmood Mamdani, academic and father of NYC Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, has recently published a book, Slow Poison, on the subject. So if you find yourself reaching for Kristen Bell’s favourite film, maybe reach for the book instead. Unless you need a dose of Forest Whitaker, then go off!
