The Devil's Double2011
The Devil's Double (2011)
TOMATOMETER
AUDIENCE SCORE
Critic Consensus: The Devil's Double has plenty of gangster spectacle and Dominic Cooper ably playing off his dual roles, but this crime epic struggles to balance the fun of bad behavior with the dead serious crimes of its subject.
The Devil's Double Photos
Movie Info
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Cast
as Latif Yahia/Uday Hussein
as Sarrab
as Munem
as Saddam Hussein/Faoaz

as Ali
as Azzam

as Yassem Al-Helou

as Kamel Hannah

as Latif's Father

as Kurd

as Said

as Lickspittle

as Latif's Mother

as Father of School Girl

as Gallaha

as Manservant
as Bride

as Mohammed
as Rokan

as Republican Guard

as Mercedes Driver

as Captain

as Amer

as Assassin

as Munem's Wife

as Rayban Kid

as Qusay

as Revolutionary Guard

as Sajida

as School Girl 2
as Hennahead

as Abdel Akle

as Kid on Crutches

as Uday's Doctor

as East German Doctor

as East German Doctor
as Beauty
as Saad
as School Girl
News & Interviews for The Devil's Double
Critic Reviews for The Devil's Double
All Critics (102) | Top Critics (40) | Fresh (55) | Rotten (47) | DVD (2)
Despite numerous pluses - Lee Tamahori's vigorous direction, handsome cinematography, outstanding production design, an impressive dual performance by Dominic Cooper as Uday and Latif - the film is more wearying than entertaining.

I'm not sure what it all adds up to, but The Devil's Double puts its hooks in you and keeps them there.
Equally as offensive as the movie's smorgasbord of smut and violence is the lingering whiff of colonial-era orientalism, a Western predilection for regarding Eastern cultures as innately idle, lascivious, irrational, and thus ripe for intervention.
The Devil's Double simply offers a trip through hell on a one-way track, like a spook-house ride at the amusement park meant to titillate and excite the senses and then deposit the rider/viewer safely on the other side in the full light of day.

A better film would undoubtedly have been a quieter, more reflective one, less tempted by Grand Guignol. But it is very watchable...

This isn't exactly a complex study of Iraqi history, but director Lee Tamahori punches it across, and the Stalinesque use of doubles in Iraq is interesting.

Audience Reviews for The Devil's Double
A lazy and terribly-directed movie that depicts Uday Hussein as a ridiculous caricature in what is a redundant story devoid of any subtlety. Besides, Dominic Cooper is such a mediocre actor, unable to lend any sort of complexity to the two identical main characters.
Super Reviewer
Although a glimpse into the decadence of the Hussein regime this bears the serious flaw of being one note. And yes, that note is loud.
Super Reviewer
An Iraqi army conscript is forced to become the body double of Saddam Hussein's psychotic son and finds himself losing his identity as he drowns in a sea of depravity and murder. There have already been a slew of projects based on the Iraq war and The Devil's Double is an interesting film in that it shows the other side of the conflict, to some extent at least. Dominic Cooper makes a decent fist of playing both the pampered, debauched and sadistic member of the Iraqi elite and his moral, working class impersonator who is appalled by the behaviour of those who rule. Sort of a bizarre cross between such diverse stories as The Prisoner Of Zenda, The Last King Of Scotland and Scarface, the excesses and violence of The Devil's Double are counterpointed by the even more bizarre fact that it is actually a true story. I think it would have been better for the greater context of the life of ordinary Iraqis of the time but it still makes for a shocking and brutal journey through the looking glass into Saddam's world.

Super Reviewer
The Devil's Double Quotes
Latif Yahia: | You forget, I died the day I came here. |
Uday Hussein: | My brother's, Welcome to Baghdad :) |
Uday Hussein: | My brother's, welcome to Baghdad. |
Uday Hussein: | Fuck! Fuck! Fuck, fuck, fuck! Fucking Kuwaitis! I fucking hate Jews, I hate horseflies and I hate fucking Persians, but I hate fucking Kuwaitis more! |
Uday Hussein: | Ali! (tilts head towards bride) |
Uday Hussein: | Ali! [tilts head towards bride] |
Ali: | (nods) |
Ali: | [nods] |