Tuesday, July 24, 2018

The Dictator (2012)

Director: Larry Charles

Writers: Sacha Baron Cohen, Alec Berg, David Mandel, Jeff Schaffer

Composer: Erran Baron Cohen

Starring: Sacha Baron Cohen, Anna Faris, Ben Kingsley, John C. Reilly, Sayed Badreya

More info: IMDb

Plot: The heroic story of a dictator who risked his life to ensure that democracy would never come to the country he so lovingly oppressed.




My rating: 6.5/10

If you saw the trailer then you got a good deal of the good gags but you MUST see this for the truly outrageously hilarious shit.  I about lost it when Cohen is attached by Busty Heart's massive mammaries.  The scene lasts about two minutes and it's one of the funniest things I've seen in a long time. 


As it progresses the fight gets wilder.  There's a spoof of the axe and the door scene from THE SHINING (1980) and if that weren't enough, they even go for a RAGING BULL (1980) reference that had me in tears.  There are about three or so great belly laughs but it's the little gags that suffer.  There aren't that many good ones outside of what you see in the trailer.  I was even often bored which didn't make sense.  This is a silly, raunchy comedy but a lot of the jokes were weak.  It felt like they should've kept working on the script until it was a much tighter and funnier flick.  I'd still recommend it because there are some very funny and clever gags that work well enough to justify the dips in quality.  Ben Kingsley fans will be disappointed as he's in a role that doesn't bring an ounce of funny.  Any number of actors could've done that role as well (or better) as he did and that's not something I thought I'd say about that guy.  However, John C. Riley is fucking hilarious in his brief two minutes.

2 comments:

  1. Make sure you watch the director's cut. (Or is it called the extended cut?) The Busty Heart fight scene wasn't shown in the theatres. The film is only half as good without it.

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    1. I didn't know that. Losing that scene is criminal. It'd definitely the highlight of the picture.

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