Click here to copy URL

Dear Dictator

2018

Lisa Addario, Joe Syracuse

Michael Caine, Odeya Rush, Katie Holmes, Jackson Beard ...

3.8

411

Comedy A young rebellious girl writes a dictator in another country for a homework assignment. The dictator gets the letter while getting overthrown by his country and he ends up on her door step in America.

	Media	Author	Review
		Justin Lowe The Hollywood Reporter	"Playful, irreverent and unafraid to be politically incorrect, the pair [Addario-Syracuse] script with assurance and direct with stylish understatement, pairing character and physical comedy to entertaining effect."
		Dennis Harvey Variety	"Instead of heading in the logical directions of farce or black comedy, it ultimately goes warm-and-fuzzy, making for possibly the most curiously inoffensive movie about a fictive despot ever."
		Simon Abrams rogerebert.com	"For the most part, Addario and Syracuse's comedy is a well-balanced mix of teen angst and adult humor. There are jokes here to satisfy everybody (…) Rating: ★★★ (out of 4)"
		Jeannette Catsoulis The New York Times	"Too leaden for farce and too bland for satire, Lisa Addario and Joe Syracuse’s 'Dear Dictator' wastes a potential gold mine of culture-clashing silliness on worn, high school movie clichés."
		Wes Greene Slant	"[It] is at once frustratingly vague and dully general (...) It's a pity that the potential comic absurdities of [it]'s premise are squandered as soon as the film settles into a tepid coming-of-age tale (…) Rating: ★½ (out of 4)"
		Tatiana Craine Village Voice	"Although the filmmakers name-check and appear to draw inspiration from 'Mean Girls', they’ve missed the mark on truly biting satire, leaving 'Dear Dictator' toothless and silly."

Return to movie

We encourage you to check the reviews' original sources. Intellectual property rights of these reviews belong to their authors and/or the correspondent media from which they have been extracted. If you'd like to help us to add more reviews to your favorite movies, just send us a message.