How do you view Idi Amin?
FOREST WHITAKER: First and foremost, he’s a soldier. I think a lot of the choices he makes come from the fact that he’s a soldier. Even in the end when things become more chaotic and the brutality begins, I think he’s really behaving like a soldier who is trying to defend himself from his enemies and destroy his perceived enemies. Before when he was a general, people were dictating who his enemies were. Now as a president, he gets to decide who his enemies are and I think it caused problems. Q: For your own sanity, did you have to come up with justifications as to why Amin did what he did? WHITAKER: Yeah. I started to play in my head all the stories that had been told to me, and also the paranoia and the fear. I saw this one image of him where I could see how he felt like he was cornered. That played in my head a lot what it feels like when you feel like you’re being attacked from all sides. What it feels like when you think the people around you are trying to destroy you. I even had t
