The Death of Stalin: Coup Comedy

If there's one thing the British know to do, it's political satire. And with writer-director Armando Ianucci at the helm, it's no surprise that The Death of Stalin is an absurd, laugh-out-loud film that also gives you much to ponder about the politics of staging a bloody coup.

Ianucci is the genius behind the TV comedies The Thick of It and Veep but here he gives us a film adaptation of a French graphic novel of the same name. Set in 1953 when Stalin (Adrian McLoughlin) keeled over from a stroke, we follow the men of the Central Committee as they jockey for position to see who will take over as the General Secretary of the Communist Party. The main contenders are the Moscow Party Head, Nikita Kruschev (Steve Buscemi), and NKVD Head, Lavrentiy Beria (Simon Russell Beale), with Georgy Malenkov (Jeffrey Tambor) serving as the clueless stooge who thinks he's really in charge of things as Stalin's Deputy.

It's a lot of Russian names, which makes following the dialogue a bit of a challenge at times, but there's nothing challenging about following the actions of these brilliant actors as they deliver inane dialogue with Shakespearean earnestness. Everyone retains their original accent, so you've got a suite of Russian leaders all speaking with a variety of English and American accents, but once you get used to that anachronistic detail, you're sold. After all, everything else is so absurd anyway. The timing of this film also couldn't be better, given that US politics is currently rife with toadies currying favor and secretly pitting people against each other to wrest control from clueless party members. In fact, while you may laugh a great deal while watching this film, later when you think about it, you might feel a little heartsick at how close it hits to home.

At the beginning of the film, there is a brilliant set piece involving a Radio Moscow broadcast, and the actual death of Stalin involves a tremendous amount of outright physical comedy that I found more hilarious than anything else in the film. I'm not that sophisticated in my comedy tastes, and it turns out that as witty and wonderful as these actors might be when delivering barbed political satire, I am far more amused when they are carrying around a body and tripping over themselves in confusion. As the movie progressed, I found it a bit difficult to keep track of all of the different plots and machinations, but as long as there was impeccable line delivery and a great deal of bombast, I didn't mind.

Lest we forget, this is a seriously dark comedy, with people getting shot every minute or so for being a political enemy (as the political situation is in flux every second, that involves a lot of political enemies). Stalin was a ruthless dictator and his policies incited fear and violence at very turn. This movie finds the absurdity in it all, but one does need to spare a thought for the folk outside the Central Committee, who lived in abject fear during this time. Like most great political satire, The Death of Stalin makes light of an impossible situation, and while you will legitimately burst out laughing in the theater, you'll feel a twinge of guilt about it when you leave.