The Death of Stalin
(2018)
Dir. Armando Iannucci
Written by Armando Iannucci, David Schneider, Ian
Martin
Starring Steve Buscemi, Simon Russell Beale, Michael
Palin, Jeffrey Tambor, Andrea Riseborough, Jason Isaacs, Paddy Considine
Armando Iannucci (IN THE
LOOP, Veep) is known for making black comedies which juxtapose the
seriousness of real-world politics with the absurd, ignorant behavior of the
flim-flamming egotists who are inevitably in charge of everything. But I guess
he might as well stop right here, because THE DEATH OF STALIN pushes that formula
about as far as it can go and still be considered comedy. Centering around the
power struggle following the titular death, the film chronicles the
machinations of various self-interested imbeciles bumbling their way towards a
leadership role that has the potential to steer the Soviet Union in either a
much more humane or a terrifyingly oppressive direction. The “humane direction”
is personified by ambitious but essentially benign bureaucrat Nikita Khrushchev
(Steve Buscemi, I NOW PRONOUNCE YOU CHUCK AND LARRY, GOWN-UPS 2, THE COBBLER),
while its opposite is embodied in the despicable, vicious Lavrentiy Beria
(Simon Russell Beale, previously unknown to me and absolutely tremendous here).
Both men are quickly caught up in a mad scramble to secure enough support to
put them on top, resulting in a flurry of desperate politicking with their very
lives, as well as the country’s future, on the line.
That doesn’t exactly
sound like the stuff of big belly laughs, but the comedy comes from the absurd
complications which pervade everyday routine in an authoritarian country where
one poorly-phrased comment can result in a horrible death. And Iannucci doesn’t
shrink away from the inherent grimness of this premise the way a less confident
director might. The first scene (which recounts an anecdote from Testimony, the
disputed, posthumously published memoirs of composer and pianist Dmitri
Shostakovich), tells us everything we need to know about the world we’re
stepping into: a harried radio producer (Paddy Considine, HOT FUZZ) receives a
phone call from Stalin himself, requesting a record of the concert he’s just
heard on the radio. With mounting terror, the producer discovers that no record
has been made. Knowing that disappointing Stalin has the potential to be
professionally disastrous and perhaps fatal, the producer frantically corrals
the musicians and audience into recreating the exact same concert a second
time, in a desperate effort to produce a single record for a single listener.
In part, this is a simple comedy of manners, with the producer’s officious
panic and the bruised dignity of all involved juxtaposed against the
ridiculousness of the request. But the stakes make all the difference; this may
feel like an episode of Fawlty Towers, but it’s one where put-upon John Cleese
might just be dragged into the street and unceremoniously executed by nonchalant soldiers if he
doesn’t pull this off.
Iannucci leans into that pervading feeling of
real, tangible danger, and doesn’t blink at following it to its grim
conclusion, including some hilarious physical comedy about an execution which
may well qualify as one of the darkest jokes I’ve ever seen on-screen. It’s a
dangerous gamble for a comedy, but it pays off: rather than resulting in a
bleak bit of misery porn, the shocking bluntness of the violence and perversity
on display make the comedy all the more potent, galvanizing the deadpan insults with a
real livewire suspense. If comedy is all about stakes, this has some of the
highest in the history of the genre, and Iannucci and his magnificent cast (which
also includes Michael Palin, Jeffrey Tambor, Andrea Riseborough and an
unexpectedly funny Jason Isaacs) are almost miraculously surefooted at
manifesting the seriousness of the situation without undercutting the queasy
humor. It works so perfectly that it almost seems simple, a trick that
only the most carefully constructed and fastidiously orchestrated comedies can
ever pull off, making the exquisitely complex look easy and intuitive. Of
course, easy is not the same thing as easy to watch; it is
a comedy, but it’s a merciless, nihilistic one that might well leave you with a
knot in your stomach. Indeed, some critics have argued that the film turns a
little too bleak and corrosive in its final minutes. But as much as it might put an end to any giddy, transgressive fun we might be having, it's also the only appropriate way for this particular story to end. That final shot of bitterness eloquently caps off a film which is consistently and thoroughly bitter about humanity, and reminds us that if there is something funny
here, the joke is certainly on us.
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