The Dictator review

Even for a Sacha Baron Cohen film, 'The Dictator' is remarkably offensive.

 At various points in this often jaw-dropping comedy, we have jokes about ‘chemo wigs’, Osama Bin Laden and even the terrorist attack at the 1972 Munich Olympics (recreated on his palace Wii).

It’s okay of course, because most of the gags come via his new alter-ego Admiral-General Aladeen, the despotic ruler of fictitious North African nation Wadiya.

[Related feature: Check out the latest clips and videos from The Dictator]

The film begins (after a tribute to Kim-Jong-Il) with a fake news report that sets up the slight plot. We learn that the vile Aladeen must give a speech to the United Nations in New York, or face military action from the west.

After arriving in the USA however his jealous older brother Ben Kingsley orchestrates a coup d’état by arranging for Aladeen to be assassinated and replaced by an idiotic double. He plans to make the fake Aladeen sign a new constitution that opens up Wadiya to democracy and, most importantly free trade. He wants to flog her oil reserves.

The assassination attempt goes wrong of course, with Aladeen losing just his trademark beard. Now unrecognisable and a ‘fish out of water’ in the big apple, he is taken in by Anna Farris’ boss of a feminist fair trade food store while he plots his revenge.

Sacha Baron Cohen is too well known these days to put his alter egos in front of real-life people, which is what made ‘Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan’ and (to a lesser extent) ‘Bruno’ so thrilling.

Instead the comedian works hard with his talented co-stars to fill every scene with precisely set-up jokes that offend as many targets as possible: black people, Jews, feminists, Americans, women in general, the Chinese, Rupert Murdoch, Hollywood celebs - he (thankfully) insults them all with equal relish.

Some of the material – such as Aladeen’s casual hatred of women - begins to wear thin by the end, but there are several comic sequences that approach the sublime.

One sees John C. Reilly’s would-be-assassin unable to torture Aladeen after the dictator criticises his “out-of-date” torture equipment.   

Another is a surprisingly touching (if you’ll excuse the pun) masturbation scene - Aladeen has never done it before - that brilliantly uses clips of leaping dolphins, soaring eagles and a scene from ‘Forrest Gump’. We’ll say no more.

But best of all is the jaw-dropping moment Aladeen and Farris’ Zoe fall for each other as they help deliver a baby, their hands tenderly touching while inside the womb. Superbly gross.

While not as ground-breaking or fresh as Cohen’s Borat or early Ali G appearances, ‘The Dictator’ still delivers more than its fair share of silly, immature belly laughs...if you have the stomach for it.

Rating: 3.5/5

'The Dictator' is due to be released in the UK on 16th May.

Watch the trailer for The Dictator