Scottish
director Kevin Macdonald of The Last King of Scotland and Black Sea recently
released the crowd sourced documentary film Life in a Day 2020, a sequel
to his 2011 YouTube film chronicling life affected by the ongoing COVID-19
pandemic, the George Floyd protests and so on.
Only released last week online, Macdonald swiftly followed that film up
with his return to the silver screen, The Mauritanian. A searing legal drama based on Mohamedou Ould
Salahi’s (Tahar Rahim) 2015 memoir Guantanamo Diary, The Mauritanian tells
the story of Salahi’s experience of being held prisoner in the Guantanamo Bay detention
camp without charge and only the loosest thinly veiled affiliation with the
terrorist attacks on September 11th, 2001.
Assigned
his case by defense attorney Nancy Hollander (Jodie Foster) and her associate
Teri Duncan (Shailene Woodley), the two meet with Salahi and upon taking the
case are met with a tidal wave of hostilities from both the victims of the 9/11
attacks as well as suppression of evidence from the US Government. Meanwhile Lt. Colonel Stuart Couch (Benedict
Cumberbatch) is tasked with mounting the military prosecution against Salahi, a
God fearing man who quickly learns there’s a lot more in the way of false or
contradictory evidence as well as human rights abuses involved in this case
than he initially realized.
In
addition to being a powerfully acted and written piece, The Mauritanian proves
to be a brilliantly photographed and framed picture as well. Shot by Danny Boyle’s cinematographer Alwin H. Küchler, the film shifts freely
between 2.35:1 panoramic widescreen with claustrophobic and gritty looking
flashbacks pillarboxed at 1.33:1. While
shifting aspect ratios has become commonplace thanks to filmmakers like
Christopher Nolan, the effect here adds to the sense of suffocating
imprisonment, making you the viewer share with Salahi in feeling trapped with no
breathing room. Also aiding the film’s
menacing atmosphere is the original soundtrack by Tom Hodge who gives the film
a somber but hopeful mood tinted occasionally by bursts of terror.
Jodie Foster and
Benedict Cumberbatch give strong performances, as always, being two of the
finest actors of their time and getting to see them together onscreen is exciting. The real weight of this picture however is
carried by Tahar Rahim who shoulders the film’s heaviest moments told in the
present and in flashbacks. The scenes
recalling the abuses committed against him during his detention are really
disturbing and not to be taken lightly. The
end of the film reveals footage of the real Mohamedou Ould Salahi which only
makes the whole endeavor resonate that much more.
A powerful but
ultimately rewarding drama that will leave you feeling shaken by what you’ve
seen, The Mauritanian went on to receive numerous Golden Globe
nominations. For all involved it is one
of the year’s strongest legal dramas and a still moving true story of one man’s
journey through Hell and back and those who fought to bring his ordeal to
light. Foster, Cumberbatch and Rahim are
brilliant in the film which itself is a technical tour de force. Not always an easy film to watch but one you
won’t soon forget.
--Andrew Kotwicki
