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How to Feed a Dictator

Play trailer How to Feed a Dictator 2026 1h 35m Documentary Play Trailer Watchlist
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Tomatometer 6 Reviews Popcornmeter 0 Ratings
HOW TO FEED A DICTATOR follows five chefs who once cooked for Saddam Hussein, Idi Amin, Pol Pot, Augusto Pinochet, and Kim Jong-il -- drawn in by poverty, necessity, fear, or ambition, and sustained by a willful blindness to the atrocities unfolding just beyond the kitchen door. Shot across seven countries and based on the acclaimed book by Witold Szabłowski, director Andrew Neel blends intimate testimony, rare archival material, and lush cinematic food imagery to create a film as visually seductive as it is morally unsparing. The sensory beauty of cuisine -- the gleam of a perfectly roasted cut, the ritual of a market at dawn -- is captured with the reverence of the finest culinary documentary, even as historical testimony reveals what that care sustained. Mesmerizing and deeply unsettling, HOW TO FEED A DICTATOR lingers like an aftertaste: a reminder that even the most intimate act of nourishment can feed something monstrous.

Critics Reviews

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Cole Groth FandomWire 2d
6/10
It's a chilling juxtaposition to hear about this warmth from men responsible for mass atrocities, but the narrative beat repeats itself constantly. Go to Full Review Mike McGranaghan Aisle Seat 2d
A gripping documentary that will make you hungry and tense at the same time. Go to Full Review Christopher Llewellyn Reed Hammer to Nail 2d
The more we starve tyrants, the better off we’ll be. Go to Full Review Hayley Croke Loud and Clear Reviews 2d
4.5/5
A masterful analysis of human behavior, world politics and life under an authoritarian regime. Go to Full Review Carla Renata The Curvy Film Critic 2d
How to Feed a Dictator is an immensely mesmerizing and deeply unsettling piece which lingers in the consciousness like an aftertaste of a dish you enjoy and detest all at at once Go to Full Review Sara Clements Next Best Picture 3d
8/10
The editing is the film's sharpest tool, cutting between food imagery and archival atrocity with a precision that makes the moral weight land in the gut. Go to Full Review Read all reviews

Cast & Crew

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Andrew Neel

Director

Keo Samoun

Self

Riccardo Orizio

Self

Coco Pacheco

Self

Ruth Ben-Ghiat

Self

Ermanno Ferlanis

Self
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How to Feed a Dictator

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Movie Info

Synopsis HOW TO FEED A DICTATOR follows five chefs who once cooked for Saddam Hussein, Idi Amin, Pol Pot, Augusto Pinochet, and Kim Jong-il -- drawn in by poverty, necessity, fear, or ambition, and sustained by a willful blindness to the atrocities unfolding just beyond the kitchen door. Shot across seven countries and based on the acclaimed book by Witold Szabłowski, director Andrew Neel blends intimate testimony, rare archival material, and lush cinematic food imagery to create a film as visually seductive as it is morally unsparing. The sensory beauty of cuisine -- the gleam of a perfectly roasted cut, the ritual of a market at dawn -- is captured with the reverence of the finest culinary documentary, even as historical testimony reveals what that care sustained. Mesmerizing and deeply unsettling, HOW TO FEED A DICTATOR lingers like an aftertaste: a reminder that even the most intimate act of nourishment can feed something monstrous.
Director
Andrew Neel
Producer
Michael Merlob, Andrew Neel, Catherine Rehwinkel
Production Co
Co Created Media
Genre
Documentary
Original Language
Arabic
Runtime
1h 35m