Thoughts on Armando Iannucci's 'The Death of Stalin'

A week or two back I went with my partner to see the film ‘The Death of Stalin’.  Familiar with the satirical work of Armando Iannucci, the screenwriter/director, I’d some idea of what to expect.  If you’ve not seen or heard about it, suffice to say it’s blackest of black humour, played for laughs by an ensemble of UK/US actors who make no attempt to sound Russian as they portray the jockeying for position and power of Stalin’s immediate circle following his death.  The ‘milk of human kindness’ has no part in this story.  On first impression, I can’t say I enjoyed it, but its humour hit home and seemed to me to be making some kind of point

Walking back, I discovered my partner had deep reservations about it.  In her opinion a serious political film ought to add to our understanding of the human condition.  She couldn’t see the point of making inaccurate caricatures of long dead political figures and the humour to her was ‘schoolboy’ in nature.  And it lacked all but scant reference to the better sides of humanity.

I found myself having to question my own belief in the virtue of satire.  And to think more deeply about why I thought it a good film – though not a great one as I too had felt the dark view it presented was not what you’d call a ‘rounded’ impression of humanity.  Satire, on the whole, doesn’t do that.  It often exaggerates greed, ruthlessness, stupidity or whatever to make its point.  Its employment of coarse humour is, I suppose, a kind of leveller, a toppling of pedestals.  But why direct it at these particular figures at this particular point in history?

I think the answer I’ve come up with is this.  It’s partly to do with context in the body of Iannucci’s work.  In ‘The Thick Of It’, his satire of modern UK politicians and their supporting staff, he portrayed them as utterly venal characters – it was like a nightmarish and foul-mouthed version of ‘Yes Minister’.  Nevertheless these unpleasant characters were reined in (to some extent) by the conventions by which we abide in Britain in our times.  By imagining Kruschev et al as virtually the same sort of characters, but able (after the precedent set by Stalin) to instigate arbitrary executions, rape and massacre at the drop of a hat, I think Iannucci is attempting to demonstrate what this sort of behaviour leads to when it reaches the point where it is completely unchecked.  It’s a warning that the characters running the show now might well do the same, given half the chance. 

Okay, it can be said that not all politicians are as blatantly venal as Iannucci chooses to portray them.  Some have strong humanitarian views and are motivated to try to advance them.  But the old saying about power corrupting, and absolute power corrupting absolutely still holds sway.  Even those with the best will in the world are, at the very least, forced to make compromises.  Satire digs at the bullshit, the spin, the front that all too often covers up for rather than admits human error and the making of less than satisfactory choices.

I don’t doubt that a serious and balanced approach, a humane portrayal of a variety of characters in such situations, some well-intentioned, some not, might add more to our understanding than ‘The Death of Stalin’.  That might make a great film, one to savour and watch repeatedly.  Iannucci’s film I wouldn’t watch again – but I’m glad I saw it the once.  As a broad piece of satire and as a warning for our times (a US President for example who has stated that he ‘doesn’t have a problem’ with the use of torture) I think it had a fair bit of value.