How To Nail a Dictator

When the Guatemalan dictator, General Efrain Rios Montt, gave an interview to a young American filmmaker in 1982 for a documentary called When the Mountains Tremble he most likely never thought that his own words would eventually bring him down.

But 30 years later the former General is on house arrest after being indicted in January on charges of crimes against humanity and genocide with his own words, and outtakes from the film, as central pieces of evidence against him.

Now the filmmakers, Pamela Yates and Peter Kinoy, have released a new documentary called Granito: How to Nail a Dictator, which examines how their film from 1982 inspired a generation of activists, leading to the indictment of a brutal dictator who had gone unpunished for years.

This week Christiane Amanpour sits down with Mr. Kinoy to discuss the new film and how a movie that wasn't shown in Guatemala until 2003, altered the country's history.

To see the film, you can stream it online at PBS.org/pov.