Cohen's Failure: Unfunny Dictator

Movie Review: The Dictator

Director: Larry Charles

Reviewed: 19 November 2012

jamesintexas rating--*

A comedy is supposed to be funny.

And Sacha Baron Cohen's latest vehicle "The Dictator" is simply not funny.

I loved "Borat" for its daring and chaotic glee.  This film seems to have taken away everything that has worked for Cohen in the past.  The script shackles him to a flimsy story of a dictator transplanted to New York City and replaced by a double.  Ben Kingsley is wasted here, as is Ana Faris, as the owner of the organic grocery store where Cohen's character finds work.  There's zero nuance, zero shading, and despite a willingness of Cohen to say or do anything, it just doesn't work.

There's just little to like here, and I don't think that it delivers on any of the promises of the preview (much funnier).

I laughed less than five times.

A comedy is supposed to be funny.