It’s being reported that Sacha Baron Cohen will be playing quite the interesting role in an upcoming movie: infamous Iraqi dictator, Saddam Hussein.

The movie, which is fittingly titled The Dictator, is based on a book called Zabibah and the King. The book is a romance novel (sorta), which is said to have been written (or ghostwritten) by Hussein, painting himself as a hero to a woman (the people of Iraq), who’s married to an evil man (that’d be us) that abuses and rapes her.

In a press release by Paramount Pictures, they describe the movie as telling the “…heroic story of a dictator who risked his life to ensure that democracy would never come to the country he so lovingly oppressed.”

Severe Clear
Directed by: Kristian Fraga
Written by: Kristian Fraga
Starring: First Lieutenant Mike Scotti
Sirk productions
Release Date: March 12, 2010 (Limited)

Hollywood has produced countless war films over the decades. From some of the earliest of wars shown in movies like Braveheart and Kingdom of Heaven, to more modern wars depicted in movies like Platoon, Black Hawk Down, Apocalypse Now, Full Metal Jacket, and Saving Private Ryan. These movies have shown us the chaos of war, the dangers of even the simplest tasks, and the immense amount of damage that can be done to a soldier, both mentally and physically.

Severe Clear is not one of these movies. It is very, very real.

The documentary features First Lieutenant Mike Scotti, who, after volunteering to extend his service, finds himself with 1st Battalion, 4th Marines, which is one of the first groups sent into Iraq for Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003. Their mission is to get to Baghdad to stop Saddam Hussein, and to find out whether he has weapons of mass destruction or not. Scotti decides to fully document this important mission first-hand using his brand new video camera (after losing 3 others to various mishaps). He records everything from him and other soldiers as they travel the seas to their destination, keep themselves entertained as they await orders, and as they face constant danger on their route to the Iraqi capital.

Continue reading for more and to see a trailer.