Retro Film Review: General Idi Amin Dada

General Idi Amin Dada was one of the most notorious dictators the world has ever seen. He is best know for orquestrating the deaths of over half a million Ugandans and expelling Jews and Asians from the country back in the 1970s. The Criterion Collection recently re-released Barbet Schroeder's documentary about the tyrant with brillantly remastered scenes. The film was shoot during the height of Amin's presidency. Although many parts of the first are just comically, one has to wonder how this man even became a head of state. Amin spends a great part of the film preparing his troops to fight the 'impending' war in Golan Heights. Quite possibly the most controversial moment in the film is when the interviewer asks Amin about his comments in a newspaper article saying that he told more Jews should have been killed during the Holocaust. Amin starts to laugh uncontrollably for a couple of minutes. He later says in the film that his country would welcome Palestinian terrorists who brought a hijacked El-AL plane to the country. Coincidentally a week after filmming, Palestinians did actually hijack a Israeli plane and brought it to Entebbe. Amin is also seen in the film making hypocritical statements about women in government and Ugandans being more 'revolutionary' (Check out the revolutionary jazz band at the beginning of the film). This is a great film that gets into the mind of evil.