Review of The Death of Stalin (2017) by Greg N — 15 Dec 2018

Armando Iannucci finds an unlikely occasion for humor in the midst of Stalin's Great Terror. It's the absurdly thin and arbitrary line between success and state-sanctioned execution that confers the comedy, as characters desperately try to toe the line between truth and whatever false narratives are currently in fashion in order to keep their heads.

At the time of Stalin's death, as the Soviet state hangs in limbo, the Great Terror looks more like the Great Confusion, where the remaining heads of Stalin's government wrangle with which truths are to become actual truths and which ones are to stay false, all while trying to one-up each other in a bid to gain power.

Whoever can determine the new truth first wins. The loser dies an enemy of the state. Handled less expertly, this film could be a madcap mess, but the clarity of all the indecision taking place is helped along by perhaps the best ensemble cast of the entire year and Iannucci's management of that cast through deft timing and efficient blocking.