The last time we saw Forrest Whittaker playing a real life person was in The Last King of Scotland. His scary performance as Ugandan dictator Idi Amin eventually garnered him an Oscar. Apparently, awards shows like it when you have James McAvoy suspended by hooks through his nipples.
Now he’s looking to a play another African leader, but one cut from a totally different cloth. Though honestly, I’m still holding out hopes for meat hooks to make a reappearance.
Whittaker will be portraying everybody’s favourite orangutan-armed archbishop, Desmond Tutu, in a story called The Archbishop And The Antichrist. The film will be an adaptation by acclaimed director Roland Joffe (The Mission, The Killing Fields) of Michael Ashton’s play of the same name.
Set during the Truth and Reconciliation Hearings, it is the fictional story of how Tutu spends two weeks meeting in prison with a brusque South African mass murderer, Piet Blomfeld. Blomfeld craves forgiveness but struggles to find anything within himself that is worth redeeming, while Tutu struggles to provide him with the absolution he seeks.
So no chance of meat hooks then. Damn.
There is no date set for the film as of yet.
Last Updated: February 16, 2012
Justin Hess
February 16, 2012 at 12:05
Let’s not write off the meat-hooks entirely. Maybe, as a means of convincing the mass-murderer that he is worthy of redemption, the arch will torture him with meat-hooks till he sees the error of his ways.
Which might be taking dramatic license a bit far but it’s still not a bad idea
James Francis
February 16, 2012 at 13:33
Whitaker is an excellent choice. May this bring him another Academy nod.
Kervyn Cloete
February 16, 2012 at 14:12
I’ve been privileged to to have actually met the Arch a number of years ago, and from my interactions with him, I think that Whittaker’s biggest challenge will be to capture the youthful and almost mischievous nature he has.
Noelle Adams
February 16, 2012 at 17:10
Psshh, if Abraham Lincoln is now slaying vampires on screen, they better up their game with this movie and have the Arch going toe-to-toe with demon hordes.