Men With Guns

GENERAL IDI AMIN DADA: A SELF PORTRAIT

Criterion Collection ($29.95)

In 1971, Idi Amin seized control of Uganda in a military coup. Before long he had paralyzed the country's economy and declared war on his domestic enemies, eventually killing 350,000 Ugandans. Barbet Schroeder's unusually nervy and direct documentary shows Amin to be the vain, illiterate nut case that he was; ironically, Amin signed off on the film personally, considering it to be a PR tool. A versatile director, Schroeder's career has also ranged from Barfly and Single White Female to Koko the Talking Gorilla. Here, his camera captures the mercurial general/president-for-life rambling incoherently about Israel, Kissinger, and world conquest, Amin's moods wavering from joviality to a blustering rage. It's his military ambitions that make the film such a study in absurdity, though. His "paratroopers" train by jumping out of the framework of a barracks about two feet off the ground, or take turns whooshing down a playground slide. Though rather short on features compared to most Criterion DVDs, there is an interview with director Schroeder in which he discusses the connections between his documentary approach and the French New Wave (Schroeder ran with the Cahiers du Cinema crowd), his fascination with Amin, and some of his stranger experiences in making the film. Find out about how Amin wins swimming races, exercises psychic powers over crocodiles, and graces tribal villages with his presence. The story of this buffoonish man, a moronic, third-rate Hitler, would be comical if it weren't so brutal and tragic. (It's worth noting that much of the score is Amin's own jolly-sounding accordion-playing.) To Schroeder's credit, he simply lets the cameras roll and doles out plenty of the rope with which Amin blithely hangs himself.