The Death of Stalin
          
Director: Armando Iannucci
Year:  2017
Rating: 8.0
Based on a graphic novel of all things (it is available on line to read), this wonderfully dark absurdist comic film has a thread of underlying dread right beneath the surface that slowly rises to the top like toxic sludge from the swamp. This covers the period from the day of Stalin's death to the power struggle that takes place in the months afterwards (though compressed to a few days in the film). The main characters involved - Beria, Malenkov, Molotov, Khrushchev - are all portrayed as paranoid, silly, gloomy, ambitious, murderous and terrified - in a very dark humorous at times Keystone cop manner. But you should not forget that these little men in big suits were psychopathic mass murderers. All of them had enormous blood on their hands in the various purges that occurred in the 1930's to the present day (1953). In those days you either purged or were purged.



For the most part this is all very accurate historically - after Stalin dies in March 1953 from a stroke there is a chaotic free for all between these men to both gain power but also survive - eventually with them targeting Beria, who was the biggest killer of them all as head of the security apparatus NKVD. Khrushchev (played by Steve Buscemi) is in the middle of this as he tries to forge an alliance with Malenkov (Jeffrey Tambor), Molotov (Michael Palin) and Field Marshall Zhukov who had been a hero in WWII.



An interesting note is that the female pianist in the opening hilarious section also was based on a true character and a similar true incident. Maria Yudina was a Russian Jewish dissenter who throughout her life pushed back against Stalin - Dr. Zhivago was read in her apartment by Pasternak. She actually did play Mozart's Piano Concerto #23 on the radio which Stalin heard and wanted a copy of - but it took place in the 1940's - not the day of Stalin's death - this was a touch of inspiration of the graphic novelists - Frenchmen Fabien Nury and Thierry Robin.



After the film ends, Khrushchev in a coup takes power two years later against Malenkov, Malenkov tries a counter coup two years after that but fails and is sent far far east to spend the remainder of his life. Molotov was a die hard Stalinist even though Stalin had sent his wife to the Gulags and fought against the reforms that Khrushchev initiated but he too was put aside to live his life in obscurity. Molotov was the guy behind the pact between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union in 1939. Maria Yudina (played by ex-Bond girl Olga Kurylenko) passed away in 1970.



This was a very good funny film about a subject that is incredibly obscure to most Americans living today and that alone makes me love it. Not surprisingly, it has been banned in Russia.