Review of The Dictator (2012) by Per H — 03 Dec 2012

The Dictator is flashes of brilliance surrounded by filler. For Sacha Baron Cohen and director Larry Charles, this is the bar that they have created with Borat and Bruno. Unlike their first two features, The Dictator is scripted, which should give the story a little more punch and bite. However, Charles and Baron Cohen elect to shoot the Dictator in a similar style and tone as Borat. Being scripted, the Dictator loses most of its shock factor, and unfortunately, adds no nuance to the story other than the obvious.

General Admiral Aladeen (Sacha Baron Cohen) is one of the most feared dictators. In the nation of Wadiya, he is known for being the recordholder in Olympic medals and sleeping with famous celebrities like Megan Fox. Across the world, he is more known for being a petty killing machine. At a UN conference, he is usurped by Tamir (Ben Kingsley), his 2nd in command, and Clayton (John C. Reilly), a US security guard. Without his distinguishing beard, Aladeen hangs around the Wadiya protestors, where he meets Zoey (Anna Faris), an activist with a vegan store and catering business. Through Zoey, Aladeen learns how to be more tolerant as well as use his knowledge of order to help Zoey cater the UN conference successfully. From there, Aladeen can take back his country from his own stand in (Baron Cohen).

With the pedigree of Sacha Baron Cohen and Larry Charles, you would think there would be more intelligence or shock placed into The Dictator. However, the plot takes a very straightforward approach to get to its ending as quickly as possible. The best shock attempts involve side adventures with a helicopter, the Wadiya Olympics, and a birth. Anything plot related mostly goes through the motions until the ending scene at the UN, which does have a very well written speech about what dictatorial powers the US can't understand. This makes the story side mostly filler, which drags until we get a good gag. Great comedies integrate their jokes into a great central story, but The Dictator's central story is mostly hollow.

Good comedies also cut right to people's understandings of some part of society and how it works. Many of the jokes in the Dictator are very bland, broad stabs at bland, broad subjects. Politics gets some interesting coverage, but the homosexuality is worse retreads of jokes we have seen before. Even the macabre humor is better used on Baron Cohen's other movies. The Dictator has lots of potential, especially being scripted, but most of the jokes lack any real bite or post-joke contemplation.

The acting is mostly unnecessary, or borderline wasted in The Dictator. Baron Cohen is fine as Aladeen and his stand in: you can identify which one is which. Anna Faris is never that good playing straight (as a lesbian lookalike here, I do see the irony in my statement), and is going through the motions like Ben Kingsley. John Reilly has some fun as the security guard and Chris Parnell is pretty good as the news anchor, but so many actors are cast against type or for shock value alone (read: Megan Fox), the biggest of which is Jason Mantzoukas, who is so good playing crazy (seriously, watch any of his stuff in The League) that it is a travesty he doesn't get to riff more with Baron Cohen's Aladeen.

The Dictator does make sure it earns its R rating, but the R doesn't stand for Risky. The Dictator's biggest mistake is playing safe with its huomor and shock. If Larry Charles and Sacha Baron Cohen choose to remake the Dictator with a more edgy story and the same actors, I will be near the front of the line; otherwise, I'll get my R rated humor from Judd Apatow.