If you saw it you remember it, and I’m referring to the solid gold poster for The Devil’s Double which is teased to the right and I showed you in larger form last week. Well, the film based on the life of Latif Yahia, body double to Uday Hussein, son to Saddam Hussein and big brother to Qusay Hussein, starring Dominic Cooper now has a trailer.
Lionsgate picked up the film out of the Sundance Film Festival where it received mixed reviews and will release it on a limited basis on July 29. Here’s a peek at the ever too long plot synopsis from Lionsgate followed by the trailer.
Based on a gripping, unbelievable true story of money, power and opulent decadence, Lionsgate’s The Devil’s Double takes a white-knuckle ride deep into the lawless playground of excess and violence known as Bagdad, 1987. Summoned from the frontline to Saddam Hussein’s palace, Iraqi army lieutenant Latif Yahia (Dominic Cooper) is thrust into the highest echelons of the “royal family” when he’s ordered to become the ‘fiday’ – or body double – to Saddam’s son, the notorious “Black Prince” Uday Hussein (also Dominic Cooper), a reckless, sadistic party-boy with a rabid hunger for sex and brutality. With his and his family’s lives at stake, Latif must surrender his former self forever as he learns to walk, talk and act like Uday. But nothing could have prepared him for the horror of the Black Prince’s psychotic, drug-addled life of fast cars, easy women and impulsive violence. With one wrong move costing him his life, Latif forges an intimate bond with Sarrab (Ludivine Sangier), Uday’s seductive mistress who’s haunted by her own secrets. But as war looms with Kuwait and Uday’s depraved gangster regime threatens to destroy them all, Latif realizes that escape from the devil’s den will only come at the highest possible cost.
I watched about half the trailer just to get a vibe and I’m not sure I’m feeling it. Is it me or does the tone of the thing seem a bit… off? It looks like it gets caught up in the gold and the glitz, which may cause for a bit of a narrative imbalance.
You can check out a larger look at the poster and a couple of images from the film right here.
