How to Feed a Dictator review – what was on the menu for some of the world’s most evil men

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Andrew Neel’s documentary contrasts the lavish dishes eaten by heads of repressive states – served by largely unrepentant staff – with the starvation faced by their citizens There are moments in this sly documentary that evoke regular food porn, with crisply lit footage of vegetables being chopped and simmered, meat getting grilled, fat bubbling and browning – all the culinary sizzle is on display. Then there are climactic money shots, obligatory overhead views of the finished product, elegantly garnished, accompanied by text identifying the dish as, say, a Chilean country stew, or a whole roast goat, made precisely to suit the taste of a very specific client. It’s just that the clients these chefs served were despots, including Pol Pot, Idi Amin, Saddam Hussein, Augusto Pinochet and Kim Jong-il. Charles Otonde Odera once prepared a human heart “perfectly” for Amin, though at the time he thought better than to ask where the raw offal came from. Director Andrew Neel and editor Brad Turn...
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Ambush review – battle fatigued Nam actioner fights worn-out war tropes

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This low-budget effort featuring phoned-in turns from Jonathan Rhys Meyers and Aaron Eckhart ticks off all the cliches while lacking a moral perspective

Jonathan Rhys Meyers and Aaron Eckhart, the big-name stars of this on-the-cheap Vietnam-war actioner, are definitely on a cushy number here. They live it up above ground as, respectively, an elite tracker and a no-nonsense general, while poor old Connor Paolo has to scurry around in the Củ Chi tunnel system for most of the running time. Hopefully his contract demanded access to a chiropractor.

Paolo plays US army engineer Ackermann, sent with his fellow “construction workers” into the netherworld to retrieve a stolen classified binder containing the names of south Vietnamese operatives undercover in the north. He’s got two hours to dodge the punji stake traps and get the job done – at which point, unknown to him, Eckhart’s expedient Gen Drummond is planning to blow the entire complex and the sensitive intel along with it. Up top, Miller (Rhys Meyers) and other special forces goons are patrolling the forest to make sure the “tunnel rats” don’t get any nasty surprises.

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