Photo Credit: Amazon.Com

Talk about a nightmare first trip away from home.  A young Scottish medical graduate spins the globe and points his finger to determine where he will go for his first grown-up adventure. He ends up in Uganda, and with way more adventure than he bargained for.

Initially committed to help out a small medical clinic in rural Uganda run by a husband and wife team, this young man catches the attention of Idi Amin. The result? A long term relationship of nightmarish proportions.

While I’m billing this film as a travel flick, it could also be valuable to anyone studying Ugandan history in the classroom. I can definitely see why Forest Whitaker won the Oscar for this performance.

Photo Credit: Amazon.Com

We recently enjoyed this Sean Penn flick over carbonara and great bottle of wine here at home. Hard core indie travelers will appreciate just how far the lead character went to check out of society and dance to his own drum.

Incorporating touches of the spiritual, this film definitely touches on how drastic we sometimes have to get in order to disengage from the chaotic mundane and hear our own inner rhythm. This guy saw his old life as somehow less than authentic and apparently more than a little wasteful. Cutting all ties and going on a multi-year journey ending with complete immersion in the Alaskan wilderness, he was able to finally release his emotional burden and learn additional life lessons before it was too late. A sad but powerful ending that left us believing had this young man lived, he would likely be a guru on the independent travel circuit. Worth watching.