"It was important we had both sides, the good and the bad," said Idris Elba.
Early scenes in Justin Chadwick's film show Mandela as a womaniser who was violent to his first wife Evelyn.
"I didn't want to deface Mr Mandela in any way," the Luther actor continued. "But I didn't want to portray him in a way that wasn't honest."
Elba was speaking at the Toronto Film Festival, where Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom had its world premiere this weekend.
Based on the former South African president's autobiography, the film charts his early life as a lawyer, his political activism and the 27 years of imprisonment that preceded his democratic election in 1994.
Naomie Harris, also British, plays Mandela's second wife Winnie in Justin Chadwick's two-and-a-half hour drama.
'Brave choice'
Terry Pheto, Naomie Harris, Idris Elba, Lindiwe Matshikiza and director Justin Chadwick of Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom
The film has had a mixed reception from critics, with one calling it "more dutifully reverential than revelatory or exciting".
"We've seen the saintly Mandela we all know and love," continued Elba, who did not meet "Mandiba" before embarking on the project.
"It was important for us to take the audience on a journey prior to that and understand who he was."
The internationally revered anti-apartheid campaigner, now 95, was released from hospital last week after three months of treatment for a recurring lung infection.
"Like everybody I've been very concerned for his health but I've been keeping optimistic," Elba told reporters on Sunday.
According to Chadwick, the Hackney-born actor was the right person for the biopic despite being from England and bearing little physical resemblance to its subject.
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