totalitarian government

But experts in the Central American nation saw it as a cynical move by a totalitarian government to bolster its profile and distract attention from its own worsening record of repression.

“There are so many stories, especially in sci-fi, that are about struggles of the weaker and against the stronger, the struggle against unfairness, against cruelty and totalitarian government and drifting fascism,” Tudyk said.

Ms. Grage took issue with the partnership because she felt that a “totalitarian government” should not be rewarded with a city partnership.

Justice Anthony Kennedy, who wrote the majority opinion in Alvarez, illustrated this danger by citing George Orwell's dystopian novel "1984," in which a totalitarian government relied on a Ministry of Truth to criminalize dissent.

“It’s not easy to make a movie to begin with, but to make it secretly is very difficult, especially in Iran where a totalitarian government with such tight control over the country and spies everywhere,” says Iranian film scholar and documentarian Jamsheed Akrami-Ghorveh.