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The Dictator (2012)

Director: Larry Charles

Time Out rating

Average user rating

55 reviews

Movie review

From Time Out London

It’s a safe bet that ‘The Dictator’ will be 2012’s only feature presented ‘in loving memory of Kim Jong Il’. This latest outrage from Sacha Baron Cohen and director Larry Charles continues the template set down in ‘Borat’ and ‘Brüno’, offering the spectacle of an outlandishly foreign, preposterously unreconstructed ego monster set loose on American soil. Despite its timeliness – North African despots are so hot right now – ‘The Dictator’ has far less satirical bite than its predecessors and is flimsier as filmmaking. But it’s funny as hell.

Admiral General Aladeen (Baron Cohen), ‘beloved oppressor’ since childhood of fictional rogue state Wadiya, enjoys a trigger-happy life of inane luxury and whimsical terror. A run-in with weapons inspectors necessitates a visit to the UN in New York, where things swiftly go from ‘Crocodile Dundee’ to ‘After Hours’: Aladeen finds himself adrift in Brooklyn, avoiding dissident diners in Little Wadiya and working at a vegan feminist cooperative run by adorably strident Zoey (Anna Faris). There’s also some business with a former underling (Jason Mantzoukas) and a nefarious rival (Ben Kingsley, underused) in the run-up to the signing of a new democratic mandate for Wadiya.

There’s a lightweight quality to ‘The Dictator’ compared to its predecessors. The fact that Aladeen’s delusions of grandeur aren’t quite delusions – he does run a country, after all – makes him less compelling than Ali G, Borat or Brüno, while the film’s other characters and plotting are perfunctory. Most regrettable is the loss of the candid-camera interactions with real-life stooges that allowed ‘Borat’ and especially ‘Brüno’ to take a genuinely sharp satirical edge to American culture; nor is there any substantial engagement with the mechanics of actual oppression. As some lame shtick with Aladeen’s imbecilic double makes clear, ‘The Great Dictator’ this ain’t – although one wittily subversive speech towards the end is pleasingly barbed.

Still, if a comedy is meant to make you laugh, mission accomplished. As a series of wonderfully grotesque set-pieces, ‘The Dictator’ delivers, from the Munich massacre à la Wii and a helicopter ride from hell to hipster blowback and genital slapstick. Baron Cohen’s talents as a clown find their the ideal vehicle in this onslaught of sheer tastelessness – a cluster-bomb of comic coups enveloping neo-cons and fem-lit, torture and amniotic fluid, linguistics and architecture, wanking and severed heads. And there is room for one touching moment: when Aladeen sees Zoey haranguing a cop, her finger in his face, her features a mask of indignant self-regard, he realises this might just be the girl for him.

Author: Ben Walters

Time Out London

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User reviews of this film

MikeT said...

Posted on May 29 2012 09:35 K.Flyer: I agree with Scrumpyjack's comments. The (feeble) joke's understood. I left the film thinking SBC had hurried the storyline and scriptwriting - there was nowhere near the attention to detail of his previous films.

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scrumpyjack said...

Posted on May 29 2012 06:58 K, I think we understand just fine luv. Jokes OVER!

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K.Flyer said...

Posted on May 28 2012 16:28 Been a while since I laughed out loud in a cinema.
As Sebastian said in his post, Some people do not seem to get what SBC was up to with this movie. It was a total comedic P**s take of all the loony dictators of recent times and also a dig at the so called democracy of the western world, summed up in his speech near the end of the movie.
Sorry guys but the laughter in the cinema last night from the audience says a lot. 4 Stars

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GS said...

Posted on May 24 2012 10:41 A limp,badly acted, juvenile mess of a film, becoming increasingly annoying as it stutters on. Waste of time.

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MikeT said...

Posted on May 23 2012 06:53 Not a scratch on Borat and Bruno. That’s not to say "The Dictator" isn’t funny in places, but on the whole it kind of limps along from one fairly lame (obvious) joke, to the next. Some of the language is over used, and by the time the film finished few in the audience were chuckling.
.
Nearly left early, but the air-con that persuaded me to see it to the end. Two stars.

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scrumpyjack said...

Posted on May 22 2012 00:05 EVERY penny spent by fools that don't know their s*** means I can waft in and out of my local cinema care free for around £1.30 a time.......carry on guys and gals x....and laughs are on me! By the way, GREAT to see it hit 2 star.....as I said it was.

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ARCHGATE said...

Posted on May 21 2012 23:32 Mayfair Tom - That makes you a loser and a racist and, apparently, a posh brass. Thanks for parting with your dosh. We need people like you to pay for tickets so that cinemas do no close down. I salute you.

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Anna L. said...

Posted on May 21 2012 23:31 Really boring and cringe worthy.

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Ace of Spades said...

Posted on May 21 2012 23:31 Comedy has died.

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Lisa in Harlow said...

Posted on May 21 2012 23:29 If you get dragged in to watch this film by your friends don't forget to take your iphone so's you have something to while away the time.

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Mayfair Tom said...

Posted on May 21 2012 23:19 Totally crap waste of time. A movie for racists and losers.

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Sebastian said...

Posted on May 21 2012 22:57 Great movie. I'd also like to add that sadly, some commenters on this page do not know what "irony", "sarcasm" and "satire" mean. Do you not understand that Cohen is making fun of racists and ridiculing racial prejudice..?

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Tatty said...

Posted on May 21 2012 15:53 Sorry - forgotten to rate

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Tatty said...

Posted on May 21 2012 15:51 Really disappointing

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Bob said...

Posted on May 21 2012 14:08 Whilst a bit silly at times its no holds barred pure comedic genius and an interesting commentary on east west divide. Absolutely hilarious. How anyone can not find this movie funny in parts I really don't understand

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