Review: In The Loop
Nov. 29th, 2009 01:04 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
angelophileI've recently grown to be obsessed with The Thick of It, Armando Iannucci's razor sharp political comedy, which can be, perhaps, best described for colonials as like The West Wing meets The Office. Armando Iannucci's been on the scene for a number of years, behind the brilliant news spoof The Day Today, I'm Alan Partridge, Knowing Me, Knowing You, producing The Mary Whitehouse Experience and more. In The Loop is ostensibly the big screen version of The Thick of It, with a few American characters thrown in, although, in actual fact, while the cast return for the big screen version, they play different characters, with the exception of Peter Capaldi, still in the same role as the monstrous spin doctor Malcolm Tucker.
However, a polish on the British cast aside, the trick is expanding the bumbling incompetence and ruthless back-stabbing of The Thick of It from Whitehall to include Washington and adding the over-arching plot of the lead-up to a proposed war. It's hardly a stretch to see where the writers got their inspiration - one of the standing jokes is that the group proposing war are officially known as the "Future Planning Committee".
The satire's savage, whether it's in the form of ineffectual ‘meat puppet’ British minister Simon Foster, (brilliantly played by Tom Hollander) triggering an international crisis with a poorly chosen choice of phrase and desperately trying to please both advocates for war and peace and coming off as a bungling incompetent whatever he does, or Malcolm Tucker struggling to come to terms with the fact that he might be top dog in London, but in Washington he's just another number in the meat grinder. The stand-off with James Gandolfini as a Pentagon General is one of the highlights of the movie.
Capaldi is, of course, the pulse of the film - an expletive and vitriol spitting, relentless monster - but Hollander provides as much of the comedy, clearly out of his depth throughout and ineptly assisted by his PA Toby (Chris Addison), while the US cast includes Mimi Kennedy and Anna Chlumsky in addition to Galdolfini and they make the most of the satire they're given, especially in their dealings with Enzo Cilenti, the ambitious, and youthful, aide.
So, if you like your satire subtle, razor sharp and aren't offended by cuss words, and plenty of them, this is the movie for you. In fact, let's not mince words here, this movie is probably the best political satire we're likely to see after Doctor Strangelove. Strong praise indeed.
However, a polish on the British cast aside, the trick is expanding the bumbling incompetence and ruthless back-stabbing of The Thick of It from Whitehall to include Washington and adding the over-arching plot of the lead-up to a proposed war. It's hardly a stretch to see where the writers got their inspiration - one of the standing jokes is that the group proposing war are officially known as the "Future Planning Committee".
The satire's savage, whether it's in the form of ineffectual ‘meat puppet’ British minister Simon Foster, (brilliantly played by Tom Hollander) triggering an international crisis with a poorly chosen choice of phrase and desperately trying to please both advocates for war and peace and coming off as a bungling incompetent whatever he does, or Malcolm Tucker struggling to come to terms with the fact that he might be top dog in London, but in Washington he's just another number in the meat grinder. The stand-off with James Gandolfini as a Pentagon General is one of the highlights of the movie.
Capaldi is, of course, the pulse of the film - an expletive and vitriol spitting, relentless monster - but Hollander provides as much of the comedy, clearly out of his depth throughout and ineptly assisted by his PA Toby (Chris Addison), while the US cast includes Mimi Kennedy and Anna Chlumsky in addition to Galdolfini and they make the most of the satire they're given, especially in their dealings with Enzo Cilenti, the ambitious, and youthful, aide.
So, if you like your satire subtle, razor sharp and aren't offended by cuss words, and plenty of them, this is the movie for you. In fact, let's not mince words here, this movie is probably the best political satire we're likely to see after Doctor Strangelove. Strong praise indeed.
