Tatiana (Odeya Rush) is an annoying disaffected teen. She's a bit gothy...but also she seems to try her best to annoy others. In keeping with this personality, it's not all that surprising that she's developed a new pen pal...General Anton Vincent (Michael Caine). Why is this not that surprising? Well, Vincent is a Castro-style dictator of a small caribbean island....just the sort of brutal guy you'd NOT want your daughter corresponding with....ever! They become friends and exchange quite a few letters....and then the weird part begins. When the General is deposed, he has to go into hiding and ends up living in Tatiana's garage! Talk about an unusual plot for a movie!!
I wasn't that excited to watch this movie. After all, it currently has a very anemic overall score of 5.0 on IMDB and most of the reviewers seem disappointed by it. But, I've recently begun trying to watch all of Michael Caine's films, so I bit the bullet and saw "Dead Dictator". Well, in hindsight I do think the score is highly inaccurate...the movie is much worse!
So what did I dislike about the film? Well, the entire premise is incredibly flawed, silly and offensive in many ways. In fact, it makes you wonder WHO thought the film would be a good idea in the first place! Imagine....a comedy where a teen and her really stupid mother hang out with and have good times with a murderous dictator who gets off torturing people!! What if they had made the guy Idi Amin, Fidel Castro or, perhaps, Joe Stalin?! And yet....it is not only meant to be funny but, in some ways, heartwarming!!
Could such a flawed premise have worked? Yes, though it would have been difficult. They really needed to make the comedy MUCH more comedic and funny. But with "Dear Dictator" it looked as if they weren't even sure if it was supposed to be funny, as there isn't much funny in the film. There's also a strange combination of sentimentality which just didn't fit. To make it worse, the dialog was pretty awful at times. Overall, a film that never should have been made in the first place as it really didn't work AND had little in the way of an audience. It didn't work as a disaffected teen film, a comedy, a romance nor as a drama. In fact...it just didn't work.
I wasn't that excited to watch this movie. After all, it currently has a very anemic overall score of 5.0 on IMDB and most of the reviewers seem disappointed by it. But, I've recently begun trying to watch all of Michael Caine's films, so I bit the bullet and saw "Dead Dictator". Well, in hindsight I do think the score is highly inaccurate...the movie is much worse!
So what did I dislike about the film? Well, the entire premise is incredibly flawed, silly and offensive in many ways. In fact, it makes you wonder WHO thought the film would be a good idea in the first place! Imagine....a comedy where a teen and her really stupid mother hang out with and have good times with a murderous dictator who gets off torturing people!! What if they had made the guy Idi Amin, Fidel Castro or, perhaps, Joe Stalin?! And yet....it is not only meant to be funny but, in some ways, heartwarming!!
Could such a flawed premise have worked? Yes, though it would have been difficult. They really needed to make the comedy MUCH more comedic and funny. But with "Dear Dictator" it looked as if they weren't even sure if it was supposed to be funny, as there isn't much funny in the film. There's also a strange combination of sentimentality which just didn't fit. To make it worse, the dialog was pretty awful at times. Overall, a film that never should have been made in the first place as it really didn't work AND had little in the way of an audience. It didn't work as a disaffected teen film, a comedy, a romance nor as a drama. In fact...it just didn't work.