SummaryThe film tells the heroic story of a dictator who risked his life to ensure that democracy would never come to the country he so lovingly oppressed. It is inspired by the best selling novel "Zabibah and The King" by Saddam Hussein. (Paramount Pictures)
SummaryThe film tells the heroic story of a dictator who risked his life to ensure that democracy would never come to the country he so lovingly oppressed. It is inspired by the best selling novel "Zabibah and The King" by Saddam Hussein. (Paramount Pictures)
The Dictator, for all its liberal leanings, doesn't let anyone off the hook, not even well-intentioned liberals. Cohen comes right out and says things that most of us, in polite conversation, wouldn't dare. He knows it's the impolite conversation that really gets things moving.
Cohen employs a comic range that ricochets between wicked political barbs and the lowest anatomical farce, to often funny and occasionally hilarious effect.
For the most part, the movie's rhythms feel slightly off -- there are long stretches without a laugh -- and there is a mean-spirited air to the whole thing.
Even amid the hit-and-miss broadsides and laugh-free longueurs that comprise most of The Dictator, Cohen's acute hypocrisy-detector keeps on ticking, if barely.
Probably the funniest movie I have ever seen
The movie tries to offend everyone at once and it makes the movie even funnier, but the movie got a lot of negative reviews because of that
I felt like it again and then the film can also be really fun. Gives some good funny moments that still make people laugh.
Light fare for in between. The film is just Aladeen.
It sets the timer off with its own jokes, it is a self created doom, at least there won't be any regrets.
The Dictator
I would like to give the credit to the director, Larry Charles and he should get it, for he is managing this entire project. But I feel like this is his (Sacha Baron Cohen) doing all the way. From start to finish, from low to high points, from head turning away moments to screen shutting moments, he loves zapping you with bizarrely wrong information. That is his kick. That is his humor. Sacha is famous for going against the opinions of.. well, the entire world. He has to be completely wrong. And for that he must know what is actually right. Now, this is where his subtlety and smartness actually pays off.
For his humor isn't just crass or offensive or edgy. It understands the day to day issue that each comic writer goes through while dealing with the obligatory aspect of the storytelling. The obligatory section is where you have to mold the structure of the film in a certain way in order to reach the goal. Now, understanding that very equilibrium gives him leverage over the command that he orders to now distract you.
He is aware of the fact that you are eventually watching a film, a comic one, in particular. And he manages to mock even those elements that not only is just smokes and ashes but is thought provoking and witty. I still don't know what sign was he looking towards when he made up a fake name in front of the police. Another repeating gag is Anna Faris and the way she is dressed in the film. All those references that he uses to describe her will remain the highlight of the film for me. The Dictator is a good anecdote that would work better in a talk show or as a stand up gig than it doea in or as a film.