A great comic

Rating: 6/10 (15 June 2014)

Charlie Chaplin plays 2 roles. He is a Jewish barber who fought in the First World War for the Germans as well as Nazi leader Adenoid Hynkel. We follow their two separate stories until the film culminates in the barber giving his address to the might of the Germany military.
Charlie Chaplin is funny and we get moments of 'laugh-out-loud' funny, because of the situations, his demeanour and his reactions. "Would you like a cigarette?" is the question, "Not now" comes the response from Chaplin as he hangs from a plane.
However, the film is too long. We get far too much Hitler preachy stuff, some tiresome shouting with Jack Oakie playing the Mussolini role and a very obvious food fight. There is also a strange scene of Hitler playing with a balloon of the globe – it's balletic but not funny. Just weird. Unfortunately, some scenes do drag on and I found myself constantly wanting a story to unfurl. I think it was a good decision by him to make this film as he really does go to town with mocking Hitler.