House of Saddam

"House of Saddam" is an excellent dramatisation of Saddam's rule, starting in 1979. With high production standards, excellent performances and truly blood chilling scenes, this is unmissable television.

This four part drama series provides an insight into the world of the Husseins and looks at Saddam's relationships with family, friends, allies and enemies. It appears to be a well researched piece and, despite dramatic licence, you feel you're watching actual events unfold.

9 out of 10. Excellent.

The rise and fall of the Iraq dictator Saddam Hussein.

What a big project this must have been. Trying to distil the best bits of Saddam's twenty four years in power in to four hours and not losing those not steeped in Middle Eat politics would appear impossible to some - but my word, they have pulled it off!

Here you have it all: Power, sex, family, violence, politics, war, madness, you name it. The complete drama play box. Yet this is a personal drama that is more interested in family and politics than needless bloodshed. Not that it isn't very gory at times. This is not for children.

You also have a fantastic lead performance from Yigal Naor. Utterly mesmerising: Deluded, multi-faced, sometimes charming and yet ruling by fear. Trusting nobody - and certainly not his friends or family. Hitler meets Idi Amin in a country with rich oil fields and - therefore - "important" to the West.

Pick of the highly convincing support cast is Philip Arditti as "first son" Uday. The mad-as-a-hatter "heir". The camera lingers/glaces on him for no reason at council and cabinet meetings, sneering or (inappropriately) looking unconcerned. He even makes Saddam look straight!

Yes, it had loads of things to crib and copy from: The Sopranos and the Godfather Trilogy among them, but it is amazing how the format fits around a story that is almost entirely true. In its major facts at least.

If there is a better mini-series played on TV this year I would be very surprised. You'll want to watch it more than once - I know I did.

in fact , am watching this drama and writing in the same time. i couldn't wait me and my husband for this to start , we are iraqi and we lived most of our lives under Saddam's regime , this is a good drama about Saddam , it starts when he came to power in 79 , so scary , so unpredictable as he always used to be , we watched him on TV , lived in a country ruled by him , and in this series i am remembering my childhood , and my life in Iraq, i believe this drama is so real offcourse except for the language which is Arabic in reality ,all characters resemble the real ones , with the music and all.

i'll give it 9 starts.

If viewers are expecting a factual summary of Saddam Hussein's life, they will be disappointed. I'm sure there are better documentaries on the subject. But for pure casting pleasure, I would heartily recommend HoS. Director Jim O'Hanlon has assembled a truly international cast, including celebrated Iranian actress Shohreh Aghdashloo (so marvelous in "House of Sand & Fog"), Indian actress Shivani Ghai, and Palestinian actor Makram Khoury (great as Tariq Aziz).

Most impressive is celebrated actor Yigal Naor as Saddam. He exudes the perfect combination of ruthlessness and charm that propelled the tyrant into power. That Hussein is portrayed by a Jew-- and Israeli-born Jew-- is probably sending the old goat into cartwheels. Pure poetic justice!

Lets set aside for a moment the acting and production value of this series, which really was good. However Saddam Hussein was known as " The Butcher of Baghdad" for a reason. This series does not address at all, the murder of tens or by some estimates hundreds of thousands of people on his explicit orders. He used chemical weapons on the Kurds, murdering over 3k men, women, and children, at Halabja, tortured countless thousands in his secret prisons, and demanded video tapes of his so called "internal enemies" being tortured in unimaginable ways. These video's exist for all to see with just a few clicks on the keyboard. Its a shame HBO produced this video in an overt attempt to further the left's narative that the U.S. went and over seas and meddled in the affairs of this quiet little country that was involved in a " arab vs. arab" affair. The truth Saddam Hussein was another dictator holding his 27 million inhabitants hostage, and subjecting thhem to a life of fearful living from Saddam, his psychotic sons (both), and his force of hundreds of thousands of secret police. They barely address the mass graves found full of his victims. If you want to kno w the truth about Iraq, during Saddam Hussein's reign of terror, the information is out there. But you got nothing but politcal spin here." Sweet Baba", and gentle soul my eye!!