A chilling vision of the House of Saddam Hussein comes to life through the eyes of the man who was forced to impersonate his equally evil son.An eyeopener at Berlin, 2011, in the Panorama section, was "The Devil's Double" by New Zealand director Lee Tamahori. The setting is Baghdad at the beginning of the nineties and the devil in question is Uday Hussein, murderously depraved and psychotic son of dictator Saddam Hussein. Since he is universally hated and in constant fear of assassination he needs to have a double to stand in for him in public. The perfect look-alike double turns out to be Latif, a Kurd who is pressed into life of dangerous luxury with full access to Uday's harem -- but only when his family is threatened. English actor Dominic Cooper (32) plays both roles in perfect counterpoint and is likely to go big-time after thus, if the film is not shunned for its extremely dim view of an Islamic society and implicit approval of Bush's Gulf War against which he film is set. Geographically the location of the shoot was the Mediterraneum Isle of Malta the only country in Europe where a variety of Arabic is the official language. Fifty two year old Australian actor Philip Quast delivers a nearly credible Saddam Hussein when called upon and bosomy French actress Ludivine Sagnier provides the love interest, what there is of it.

The Devil's Double. Based on the book written by a soldier who was forced to become Saddam Hussain's son's double in the times of America - Iraq war over Kuwait. The movie gives you good insight into the spoiled son's lavish and insane life and how his double, our hero never finds himself ready to lead his kind of life. An earthy Dominic Cooper plays both parts effortlessly. As Saddam's son Uday, he makes you hate him and as the double Latif he make you care for him with ease. As a bonus, you get to see Saddam Hussain's character playing some key scenes which leaves you wanting for more. Being based on a real story, however movie gets a bit melodramatic at moments but drama and performances keep you engaged. I am going with good 7 out of 10 for The Devil's Double. Movie never tries to go into the deep of war times but makes an engaging watch over playing a devil's double.

I recorded this off the TV not expecting much and got round to watching it yesterday. Wow! I was not expecting this! This is certainly not for the faint-hearted mind. Dominic Cooper is mesmerising in his roles here and I don't think I was the only one that could not believe, on the film ending, that he actually played both roles...brilliant performance. And when I actually found out that most of this is based on the truth or certainly near to it that made it even better for me.Its fascinating because although the dialogue is all English, it doesn't feel like a US/UK film at all. I think they did the right thing in doing the dialogue all in English overall even though doing it in the native language/dialect would have been interesting as well.If you like The Godfather, Scarface, gangster films but want to see a bit of reality as well give this film a go. I have just ordered the Blu-ray so I can watch and hear it in HD which Im sure will make it even better. Its not one of my favourite films but its a solid 8/10 no problem and that makes it a buy for me.

I did not expect to enjoy this film. I decided to give it a go as a way of increasing my knowledge of the world and recent past events (or rather decreasing my ignorance), but then got so much more out of it.The basic premise reminded me of The Parent Trap. Not so surprisingly, however, Cooper does a much better job than Lohan of keeping each character distinct. Our warmth towards Latif grows in the same measure as our disgust towards Uday.The only difficulty characterwise is in understanding why Uday behaves the way he does. But I guess this is what makes us hate him rather than pity him. The fact that he's a complete mamma's boy is a nice touch, however, and adds a little bit more texture to the character.Like The Parent Trap, there's some mild humour running through. Unlike The Parent Trap, the violence is anything but mild.So by the end of the film I have fulfilled my objectives of learning more about the world (Iraq-Kuwait war, Hussein family) and seen a moving film with good characters in the bargain.