Republished from the show notes of my other site, Fuds on Film.
The Mauritanian is based on Mohamedou Ould Salahi’s memoir Guantánamo Diary, and to anyone that’s been paying attention simply bringing up the spectre of Guantanamo will tell you all you need to know about what you’re going to see in this film.
Salahi is played here by Tahar Rahim, and is taken from his family home in, well, Mauritania, and held without charge under suspicion of involvement in the 9/11 attacks in the mildly controversial Guantánamo Bay facility ultimately for over fourteen years, excluding the occasional jaunt to CIA black sites for a spot of the ol’ enhanced interrogation ex plus alpha.
His case is eventually brought to the attention of defence attorney Nancy Hollander, played by Jodie Foster who takes on the case and, in the process of uncovering the facts of the case, we’ll hear a bit of the life story of Salahi, which to be scrupulously fair would have warranted a bit of questioning at least, but surely not the horrors inflicted on him by the American Torquemadas.
On the other side of the coin is the military prosecutor, Lt. Colonel Stuart Couch (Benedict Cumberbatch), tasked with and heavily encouraged to secure a prosecution, but in the course of reviewing the supposedly damning evidence finds on hearsay and the same takeaway as the Spanish Inquisition, that being that if you torture someone enough they’ll eventually tell you what you want to hear. To his credit, he does the right thing and refuses to prosecute this non-case – it’s just a great pity the US Government cannot come to the same conclusion and waste another six years of an innocent man’s life in appeals.
I don’t believe I have anything particularly negative to say about any aspect of this film – as opposed to the subject matter, which would warrant as much negativity as I could muster for as long as I have oxygen, however I would be lying to you if I said I can muster a great deal of enthusiasm in talking about it. To be clear, Rahim, Foster and Cumberbatch are all great and director Kevin Macdonald keeps things bombing along well enough, if you’ll pardon the phrasing.
Perhaps it’s just the miserable nature of the central content that makes it hard to be enthusiastic about, which compares rather poorly on my part given the frankly incredibly forgiving and reasonable attitude that Salahi has shown throughout and after this ordeal.
It’s a very well made and put together film, telling a story that needs to be told, especially given that Guantanamo Bay is, barely believably, still stinking up the joint. If you’re in the mood for an alternately miserable and enraging experience, get this in your watch queue.