There is a reference to The Godfather in one of the first scenes where Latif is impersonating Uday. He acts as a double when entering and leaving an important meeting. When he leaves and is shot at by a young boy an orange cart is shown prominently with oranges falling. Oranges were present whenever death occurred or was about to in The Godfather and there was an orange cart featured when Don Corleone was shot at it.
A very long list of sources have challenged Yahia's claims, including a former palace guard, one of the Hussein family's surgeons, a CIA officer, and at least two of Uday's confidantes. One of the latter claimed Yahia was nothing more than a lookalike who used his resemblance to pick up women.
Despite playing Iraqi characters, Dominic Cooper is British.