
The Absent One
2014


1.3K votes
The true story of the Mauritanian Mohamedou Ould Slahi, who was held at the U.S military's Guantanamo Bay detention center without charges for over a decade and sought help from a defense attorney for his release.
Director
Kevin MacdonaldStreaming availability for India
Powered by JustWatch The MauritanianStatus
Released
Original Language
German
Budget
N/A
Revenue
$7.5M
Production Companies
If you enjoy reading my Spoiler-Free reviews, please follow my blog @ https://www.msbreviews.com As I wrote in countless other reviews of the same genre, I mostly enjoy movies "based on a true story" since these almost always accomplish my main expectations: to be enlightened on an event or subject matter I didn't know (much) about. The real-life story of Mohamedou Ould Slahi was obviously unknown to me at the time of this viewing, but The Mauritanian does a great job in telling his shocking, insane, unbelievable life at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp. The existence of this outside-the-…
Read full review →Based on the New York Times best-selling memoir “Guantánamo Diary” by Mohamedou Ould Slahi, “The Mauritanian” tells the true story of a man who spent 14 years of his life imprisoned without charges at the notorious United States military detention facility. The film is a standard legal drama that focuses more on the man and his case rather than the atrocities that were levied against him. It still reinforces what most of us already know: Gitmo was a terrible, terrible place. Detained on the suspicion that he was connected to the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Slahi (Tahar Rahim) was held by the U.…
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Emotionally powerful thanks to the great actors (especially Rahim) and with a gripping true story, ‘The Mauritanian’ exceeds expectations, even if the overall film could have been a bit more polished. 9/10