Chaplin plays the double role of the persecuted Jewish barber and Adenoid Hynkel, dictator of Tomania. The barber is imprisoned, escapes, and is finally mistaken for the dictator at which point he makes an impassioned, humanistic speech which amazes the dictator's followers.

"Today Mussolini is remembered as a hated dictator who, along with Hitler and Stalin, ushered in an era of totalitarian repression unsurpassed in human history. But how was he viewed by ordinary Italians during his lifetime? In Fascist Voices, Christopher Duggan draws on thousands of letters sent to Mussolini, as well as private diaries and other primary documents, to show how Italian citizens lived and experienced the fascist regime under Mussolini...