Review | The Mauritanian movie review: Tahar Rahim excels in exhilarating Guantanamo drama
- Tahar Rahim plays a suspected terrorist who spent years locked up in Guantanamo Bay after being accused of helping plot the 9/11 attacks
- Jodie Foster, Shailene Woodley and Benedict Cumberbatch co-star in the riveting drama that will leave viewers enthralled – and mad as hell
4.5/5 stars
A compelling, provocative drama, The Mauritanian is a real gut-punch of a movie. Chronicling the life of Mohamedou Ould Slahi, who spent years locked up in Guantanamo Bay, it’s a long, exhausting but ultimately exhilarating watch, fleshed out with excellent performances and a director who offers a measured and absorbing account of Slahi’s fate.
Slahi was arrested and shipped out to Guantanamo, the controversial US detainee centre on Cuban soil, with American intelligence officials believing that he was part of the al-Qaida network that plotted the 9/11 attacks in 2001. There is flimsy evidence – like records suggesting he received a phone call from his cousin using Osama bin Laden’s phone. Crucially, he was imprisoned without charges, trial or conviction.
Played by A Prophet star Tahar Rahim, Slahi gets a sliver of hope when American lawyer Nancy Hollander (Jodie Foster) takes up his case, with the help of her assistant Teri Duncan (Shailene Woodley), both under the belief that anyone – even a potential terrorist – deserves a fair trial. On the opposite side is prosecutor Lt. Col Stuart Crouch (Benedict Cumberbatch), determined to ensure Slahi gets what’s coming.
Recalling Michael Winterbottom’s dram-doc Road to Guantanamo, The Mauritanian evocatively recreates the prison camp and the terrible tortures that Slahi endures, including sleep deprivation, violent threats and waterboarding that eventually elicit a forced confession. It’s chilling to watch, but British director Kevin Macdonald does not linger over the scenes salaciously.