The cold tension that best demonstrates the colonel's silent nature. Mercy isn't in his vocabulary without even the slightest ounce of him speaking.
Another Antoine Fuqua-related film. At this point I might actually come to understand what my parents saw in films like this but again, I am a binge-watcher for a reason but at the same time, becoming a bit of a fan for films like this. Nevertheless, this is another discussion to grant me more room to find enough determination to proceed with my latest upcoming candidates but in the meantime, let's settle in with a decent film about a rescue mission going sideways that could concur in real-life.
To be short with it, it's basically a Die Hard-ish film every time it stars Bruce Willis. However, these are those times were Willis puts away the action-flick tropes and suit up to a much more approachable outlook that sheds new light to his acting days, unless we exclude the later bad Die Hard installments and got ourselves another vile war criminal as the Big Bad of said film. What he had his soldiers do is... sadly accurate to most Nigerian civil wars and other conflicts elsewhere in Africa. That put, makes him an easy qualifier, though what makes him unique is the fact that he's "silent but deadly". People, let's get down to talking about the horrifically silent Nigerian military official, Colonel Idris Sadick.
BTW, couldn't find any promising quotes or indirect ones to accurately and perfectly describe him since he's mostly, to reiterate, silent throughout the whole film.
What's the Work?[]
Tears of the Sun is the 2003 American action-thriller war film directed by Antoine Fuqua (Yes, the same genius behind few of Denzel Washington's films), starring Bruce Willis, the father of the Die Hard franchise.
Focusing on a depiction where a US Navy SEALS rescue team was sent to recover and bring back a US citizen out of Nigeria. Lieutenant A.K. Waters is determined to ensure Dr. Lena Kendricks is rescued safely before violent tensions and inevitable conflict is aimed their way. Though just when it is believed to be that Dr. Kendricks is the only one demanded to be rescued, things take a different turn when Lt. A.K. Waters does everything in his power to do the best he can for the Nigerian refugees.
Who is He? What has He Done?[]
Colonel Idris Sadick is a vile, rogue Nigerian military colonel and commanding leader of the Fulani Rebels who was one of the influential supporters of General Mustafa Yakubu in the coup d'etat he led.
During the Nigerian Civil War where Mustafa reigned the victory and ruled Nigeria with the pursuit of ethnic cleansing against the Christian Igbo, followed by the nigh-assassination of the entire Azuka family lineage, Sadick engages in persecuting and massacring countless innocent civilians, refugees, and survivors in the aftermath. Indicated to be leading the charge of the ongoing ethnic cleansing of the Igbo following Mustafa's reign and on his behalf, Sadick endorses his personal battalion into attacking and raiding several villages throughout the lands, especially whoever went to different churches. It it also said that Sadick had his rebel troops do a horrific practice of viscerally mutilating and ripping off women's breasts - mostly those who are mothers - to prevent them from feeding their babies and he was never above gathering children they took in to become child soldiers to expand numbers. Assigned to go after Arthur Azuka, a surviving member of the Azuka family, and kill him, Sadick blackmails a refugee named Gideon into keeping track of Arthur's every move within a hospital mission, St. Michael's, with his family hung onto his mercy should he fail to report back every now and then. It also implied by Dr. Lena Kendricks that during her time,
This scene was hard to watch. Picture that someone was vile as Sadick was willing to target a church that took in sick, wounded survivors.
First introduced entering St. Michael's where Lt. A.K. Waters, Dr. Lena Kendricks, and their entire group first left to be brought off the country, Sadick and his men confronts Father Giovanni - the head priest - and Sister Siobhan O'Connor when they were still in the middle of tending to the wounded. When Father Giovanni pleaded for them to leave and that they are no threat, Sadick notices the former has a crucifix around his neck and under a vicious whim, condoned his right-hand, Commander Samuel Terwaze, into decapitating him while green-lighting his men to open fire at the patients and the two sister nuns, the other being Sister Grace McIntyre, to death. With the mission church now left in a tragic, bloody setup, Lt. A.K. Waters and Dr. Kendricks would pass by the horrific aftermath after boarding the latter in the helicopter, now changing his mind to transport the elderly and child refugees while setting up the rest to meet up at Cameroon. When Terwaze discovered that American Navies have entered Nigerian territory, rescued several refugees and Kendricks, and instructed the remaining survivors to the destination of Cameroon, Sadick has his rebel soldiers march to their exact location to begin an ambush.
While not present at that time, we see a portion of Fulani Rebels who are likely belonging to Sadick's battalion and presumed to be under his orders, attacked another village where they butchered, mutilated, bludgeoned, beating them to death, shoot off the villagers, even burning them alive and forcing some to dance for their own sadistic amusement while likewise killing them. They've gathered their corpses into massive piles around to the point of ravaging the place into becoming a graveyard itself, which painfully, we see a graveyard with a woman mourning her baby's corpse. That's when Lt. A.K. Waters and his troops would soon find out that the rebel soldiers also weren't above raping the women there and killing babies, which few scenes later presented two women being raped with one of them done so to death and another dragged away to the same fate, followed with the former's baby killed during the process, but at the same time, her breasts were cut off. The heinous monstrosities they've committed were so vile and disgusting that fellow SEAL Navy member, Zee, carved up and stabbed the same soldier who did the mutilated woman out of emotional anger.
Later on, as they found the corpse of Gideon once he was found out, they are too little, too late in realizing they are ambushed by a hidden grenade attached to Gideon's neck, killing few of their men. Still making their way to the Navies and the refugees in the Tnadjile Pass regardless of the current losses, followed by requesting backup from Gashanka, Sadick and Terwaze leads charge against the former in the battlefield, resulting in destructive firepower one after another and heavy deforestation, building up to where casualties on the refugees were met wounds, several of them dead (including Okeze, Arthur's guardian), and Slo being shot, bleeding to death. On the second round, more refugees were caught killed in the crossfire and the battle escalates to the Rebels charging while the Navies tried to get the refugees to safety, only then would Lake and a refugee woman he tried to save get caught in the shooting, another shot caught Flea in the field, a rocket launcher was used directly at Dr. Kendricks and Zee, and Silk getting shot as well.
It was only a matter of time until Zee contacted air reinforcements awhile back, thus Star One jet fighters came in the nick of time to give the Fulani Rebels rising hell as they are gunned down in the explosion, followed by Terwaze being among those casualties. Unfortunately, we do not see Sadick elsewhere within the battlefield prior to this or perhaps was, either he died in the fields or escaped somewhere scot-free, hopefully it was the former being his well-deserved fate.
Heinous Standards[]
While the aforementioned General Mustafa Yakubu led a brutal coup that escalated to a civil war, culminating up to thousands of innocent lives taken enough to fill entire graveyards, usurping and executing President Samuel Azuka and almost his entire family, persecuting ethnic cleansing of the southern Igbo and their Christian ethnic community, ruling Nigeria with an iron fist and controlling its oil supply, thus setting the film's standards. Outside his reign and power, Sadick is one of the only few official commanders we see from the Fulani Rebels and the only one leading a battalion of his own, as well as having backup connections with the Gashanka military section, to which he makes great use of them in the resource department. Followed by strong implications that he is in charge of the ongoing ethnic cleansing.
| “ | Silk: How can they do this? Patience: This is what they do. They cut off the breasts of nursing mothers... so that they'll never again feed their own babies. This is what they do. |
„ |
| ~ It gets even more heartbreaking when it takes a truly pure, sweet person like Patience to reluctantly explain the monstrous nature of the Fulani Rebels and to some extent, Sadick himself. |
This entire collage altogether demonstrates how much death, suffering, grief, and pain Sadick and his battalion has caused throughout carrying Mustafa's ethnic cleansing. Brings out traumatic vibes to Hotel Rwanda.
Despite this being seemingly on Mustafa's behalf, Sadick's massacres against villages and churches do nothing to withdrawn his cruelty with no boundaries as he takes pleasing sadism over personally causing the St. Michael's mission massacre, which he had decapitated Father Giovanni, later killing two nuns and a majority of the patients and refugees there, mostly the former - whom all are wounded and heavily injured after surviving past massacres. There's also another village massacre likely done on his behalf too, one that oversaw soldiers shooting off, beating, mutilating, burning, and even forcing some villagers to entertain them as they died, where hundreds of corpses were piled everywhere and the whole place torched into a graveyard. What makes his persecution worse is the fact that he endorses his soldiers into raping women, killing children and babies (especially the latter being the utmost appalling to the Navies), and the horrific showcase of the Fulani Rebels' vile practices, graphically cutting off the breasts of mothers and women alike. Which we see one of them put through such a thing while she was raped and her baby killed, coupled with Sadick bringing in children to become child soldiers, as seen with Red shooting one without realizing it.
All of this can even culminate to personal villainy for Lena Kendricks, given she lost her husband to them and everyone at St. Michael's, and to an extent, Arthur Azuka, who not only lost his father but his mother and two younger sisters, and A.K. Waters and few SEAL Navies who were appalled by Sadick and his rebel battalion's actions to the point the former chose to save the following refugees as best as he could while processing the atrocities they've been condoned to commit. Not to mention that through his soldiers, he succeeds in killing four out of the remaining SEAL Navy members (Slo, Lake, Flea, and Silk) and several refugees, with Okeze - Arthur's guardian - being among the casualties. While one may argue that Sadick mostly sits behind the lines as his right-hand, Terwase, calls out the shots, and that most of the massacres aren't likely tracing back to his words, the former and the latter are between the exact opposite and unlikely to be the case.
Again, he's the only official commander besides Terwaze to be appear outside Mustafa and his cronies, and the narrative makes it clear that Terwase mostly serves as Sadick's voice to his rebel battalion, thus having some plausibility that through his right-hand, Sadick is calling the shots and endorsing the massacres. As for the second massacre involving a village seeing women's breasts cut off, raped, and children and babies killed? Remember our friend Gideon, who was blackmailed by Sadick via threatening his family? If one could connect the dots and how they've been following the Navies and the refugees throughout their way to Cameroon, it would make absolute sense that Sadick and his men were aware of where they were heading and it would explain the timing on how they've gone onto a village the latter were passing through in the first place. What also helps is that Mustafa is too hands-off to persecute the ethnic cleansing of the Igbo, meanwhile Sadick has all influence and drive of handling the massacres that all fault on the monstrous, vile acts the rebels has committed against innocent villagers can all be traced back to him.
As for the cherry on top? I think his cruelty to everything he's endorsed from the massacres, mainly the St. Michael's mission massacre, puts him a whole new kind of vile before Mustafa. That said, I can conclude that this is an easy pass for him.
Mitigating Factors[]
I'll keep it short, characterization is seemingly his only issue since throughout most of the film, he never ounces a single word or line with Terwaze himself acting as his voice and command. Regardless, his entire body language and facial expressions as seen when observing Father Giovanni's crucifix and understanding Terwaze's strategies to ambush the Navies and the protected refugees establishes Sadick's character very well. It's clear as day that Sadick enjoys killing the innocent without even the slightest remorse, even going as far as to smugly have Father Giovanni decapitated while deaf falls all ears to him when he pleaded, coupled with being completely uncaring of his soldiers' lives loss during his fight with the Navies and is intellectually enough to go along with Terwaze's advice. Albeit for superficial reasons.
Besides that, absolutely none. His surname is literally a homonym for the French word "Sadique", which means "sadist". You just really gotta love how unapologetically subtle action-flick/drama baddies tend to get named based on their nature alone.
Final Verdict[]
Another solid yes from yours truly.