The Personal History of David Copperfield (4/5 Stars)

 

Writer/Director Armando Iannucci is one of my favorites. He is responsible for the early career of the British comedian Steve Coogan (David Partridge) and the best TV show about British politics (The Thick of It). Thereafter, he made a great movie that crossed over his British political show into American politics (In the Loop) and then seamlessly transferred his skills to one of the best shows about American politics (Veep). Since leaving Veep, he made a masterpiece, The Death of Stalin, which I called in my review a perfect marriage of artist and subject matter. His work, a worthy successor of Monty Python, is defined by that very British and very cruel sense of humor (a worthy American successor of Monty Python along the same lines is South Park). 

In the spirit of Monty Python then, And Now for Something Completely Different! For the first time in Iannucci’s career, he has expended money on set design and costumes. The Personal History of David Copperfield is a lark to look at it. It adapts the 19^th century Charles Dickens' novel with color and flair. The stolid realism of his political films is completely gone. Moreover, the movie's storyline zips and churns through scenery and characters in a frenetic and fantastic pace. It is a giant leap in style for Iannucci and he accomplishes it like a natural.

The screenplay which Iannucci co-wrote with longtime collaborator Simon Blackwell. I have not read this particular Dickens work novel, but having read other of his books, I expect the screenwriters put in excellent work, omitting much extraneous details were successfully edited out while successfully retaining the emotional core and finding room for plenty of jokes. This does not feel like the usual Dickens adaptation, which is all the better because I have never felt Dickens to be especially adaptable.

In fact, I’m not sure I particularly like Dickens. I'm not sure I approve of the way he gave characters names that automatically signaled how you are supposed to feel about them, as if a book could be judged by its cover. Anyhow, if one were to adapt a Dickens book, what with all its contrivances, this would be the movie to show it is to be done. The unabashedly caricatures of personality are here. David Copperfield is as earnest as earnest comes. Mr. Murdstone is a mean monster. Uriah Heep is a total piece of shit. It is an unfair story told in an unrealistic abstract way as if to signal to the audience like a B movie would, hey this is not real life, have fun and enjoy yourself.

This brings me to the most noticeable part of the movie, what the movie has termed “color blind casting”. As you may suspect, this 19^th century British novel about British people ought to be entirely populated by British people. However, Iannucci has cast an Indian in the title role (Dev Patel of Slumdog Millionaire fame), and several black people, some other Indians, and a Chinese man (Benedict Wong) in several of the supporting roles. 

Does this work? I am reminded of one of the stupider conversations I ever had with someone, a former roommate that attended the same college as Lena Dunham. He believed that Leonardo DiCaprio’s role in The Revenant could have been played just as well as a black man. (This role is based on the real-life personage of a fur trapper in 1820s America in the Louisiana Territory). I thought that point of view was idiotic. The movie was attempting to be as realistic as possible. It went so far as to shoot only with natural light. An undisguised black man as the protagonist would have been absolutely weird. I still stand by this sentiment, but at the same time, as a resident of New York City, I have seen many productions of Shakespeare plays which rely on color-blind casting. And for Shakespeare plays, color-blind casting works very well. After all, Shakespeare never had production value so there is very little realism in his works. The merits of his plays rely almost exclusively on the poetry of his words and acting, which can be done by anyone who can master the correct accent and style of performance. The color blind casting here works in the same way. There are many different ethnicities represented by the actors, but every single one of them speaks their lines in perfect 19th century English accents. (Not coincidentally I suppose, but the actors, if not British, come from places that have ties to the British Empire, in particular India, Africa, and Hong Kong. There are no Latin or Arab cast members).

The way the movie is presented is itself more abstract then realistic. Within this environment it makes sense to simply find the best actors around. Dev Patel, who has a very Tom Hanksian earnest everyman quality to him, is well cast in the lead role of David Copperfield. And I always like seeing Benedict Wong in anything. It would have been awesome if that was Chloe Sevigny in blackface, but apparently there is a black woman who looks just like her with the name of Rosalind Eleazar. The rest of the cast that is white is a who’s who of interesting actors: Tilda Swinton, Hugh Laurie, and Peter Capaldi amongst them. Then there is Ben Whishaw who plays Dickens’ classic creep Uriah Heep. He does a particularly good job at making one’s skin crawl as soon as he shows up on screen. I am reminded once more by how much Dickens hated lawyers.

The movie moves swiftly from interesting caricature to interesting caricature and through comedic interludes and dramatic pratfalls. It ends with a artistic cop-out that is becoming as cliched as a story ending in marriage or death. The main character aspires to be writer. He writes a book about the people within the story. This story is published and becomes wildly successful. And The End, Happily Ever After.

I have seen this sort of ending perhaps a dozen times. What does it mean? Does it not say that all the hardships we endure in our lives can be automatically validated if the general populace pays attention to it and bestow upon the writer fame and fortune? Is that true? If two people have an argument, and only one is famous, and as a result only one side of the argument is told, is there then only one side of the story, and the argument won. Perhaps I am being a little cynical. However, it has been postulated that David Copperfield is a veiled autobiography of Dickens. If it supposed to be at all objective, is it fair to give your step-father the surname of Murdstone or to name anyone you once knew Uriah Heep. Apart from that, I really did like this movie.

The Death of Stalin (5/5 Stars)

Democracies get all the bad press as dictators and totalitarian governments don't allow their citizens to complain about them. So there seem to be several movies a year that feature the failings of American politics (not to mention daily editorial pieces in press) but not so many concerning the truly awful governments. When the truly awful governments are covered, they get the Nazi treatment so to speak. They are the evil antagonists in the action blockbuster or serious drama. Almost never are unspeakably bad governments used for laughs. That makes the horrifying and hilarious satire “The Death of Stalin” a rare treat. Watching it will not only make you laugh but thank your lucky stars no movie like this could ever be made about America.

The writer-director of “The Death of Stalin” is Armando Ianucci. It is a perfect meeting of man and material. Mr. Ianucci has spent the last decade and a half satirizing British politics (“The Thick of It”) and American politics (“Veep”) and at least one time both (“In the Loop”). Mr. Ianucci specializes in cruelty. In British and American politics this played out in bullying, betrayals and language whose foulness was only matched by its creativity. In Soviet politics, women are raped and men are murdered. Mr. Ianucci may be the only person in the business that could have pulled off the black humor in this picture as well as he does.

If one ignores the sheer terror of it all, Russia under Stalin had a lot that was funny about it. When Stalin collapses from a stroke late one night, his guards are so scared of Stalin’s potential anger for needlessly interrupting him that they pretend not to hear anything. Stalin is not discovered until the morning. When he finally is discovered, it is determined that a doctor should be called. However, Stalin had previously ordered the murder of all the best doctor’s in Moscow because he believed that Western medicine was a conspiracy. The inferior doctors are brought in to help. However, they do not use the equipment that would save Stalin’s life because it was manufactured in the United States. Stalin eventually dies betrayed by the incompetence his despotic rule bestowed upon his country.

The movie is the comedic version of “1984”. Everyone participates in ‘double-think’. That is the ability to know something is untrue and to believe it anyway because Stalin said so. Everyone knows that Stalin is a homicidal maniac. When they hear of his death, they grovel and weep and mourn deeply their country’s awesome loss. Meanwhile a power vacuum has opened and the member’s of Stalin’s highest committee start vying for power. There is a great scene where they must pretend to continue to believe Stalin is without error while making their first order of business to stop the latest round of political assassinations Stalin had just ordered the week before.

The two men vying for ultimate power after Stalin’s death are Lavrenti Beria (Simon Russell Beale), the head of Stalin’s secret police, and Nikita Khruschev (Steve Buscemi). Stalin’s successor-in-name is his deputy Georgy Malenkov (Jeffrey Tambor). Rounding out the committee is Vyacheslav Molotov (Michael Palin). Mr. Ianucci makes an interesting choice in directing the actors to use their regular voices instead of adopting Russian accents. This choice is confusing and then illuminating. After all, Russians do not hear accents when they speak to each other. (The best version would be for all the actors to speak Russian. However, that would impair Ianucci’s ability to write sharp satire in his style.) So everyone might as well speak in their native accents. This reminded me of the American accents in “Amadeus”, which also worked remarkably well.

The performance of Steve Buscemi is a revelation. Like the actor, the man Khruschev seems a harmless character actor. But this betrays a deep political cunning, which Iannucci and Buscemi slowly develops until the moment of action when Nikita outmaneuvers his enemies and takes control. Then the comeuppance is chilling and exhilarating. As Khruschev also seems to be the least worst of all the members of the committee, this brutal satire also unexpectedly has a happy ending. Jeffrey Tambor as well is perfectly cast as a weak man. Michael Palin’s presence appropriately connects Iannucci’s style with its most obvious predecessor, Monty Python. This is a great movie. Unsurprisingly, it has been banned in Russia. Apparently they are still afraid of Stalin over there.  

In the Loop (5/5 Stars) September 7, 2009

Climbing the Mountain of Conflict like a Nazi Julie Andrews! 


Writer/Director Armando Ianucci should be crowned the British King of insult comedy for his new political satire “In the Loop.” This is Iannucci’s feature film debut. He is best known for his TV Show “In the Thick of It,” which contains many of the same actors playing the same characters. That show and this movie are about the same thing: A no holds barred, hysterical, unsympathetic, and way too realistic feel of how a bureaucratic democracy works. They say that policy is like sausage: good to eat but you probably wouldn’t want to see how it is made. Well, welcome to the Sausage Factory, I sure hope this isn’t really what it looks like. “In the Loop” concerns the buildup to an American invasion into some Middle Eastern country based on faulty intelligence provided by the British Government. We get to witness the ground war of this bureaucratic obstacle course as the many ministers, senators, and office aides battle it out over the course of committees, lunch meetings, cocktail parties, and what not. It’s like as if ‘The Office’ was not about paper but weapons of mass destruction and everybody cursed like a sailor. The expletives and insults contained within this movie flow so freely and creatively and nonstop that sometimes I simply was astounded by the incivility of some of it (especially when the characters wouldn’t hesitate to direct their profanity at women). I was astounded that is when I wasn’t laughing my ass off. I haven’t laughed so hard and so often in a movie since I watched ‘The Hangover’ earlier this year. Before that I would have to go as far back as ‘Tropic Thunder.’ What I’m trying to say is that this movie is hysterical. At times I was literally rolling in my seat. And It Is nothing but laughs despite the serious subject matter. There is not a single dramatic scene and only one dramatic pause in the entire movie (I will talk about that later). The rest of the movie is simply nonstop clever insults and witty dialogue. I will now quote several lines courtesy of IMDB as there is no way I could possibly give the movie any justice by only describing the scenes. 

Simon Foster: Tobes, I don't want to have to read you the riot act but I am going to have to read you some extracts from the riot act, like section one, paragraph one: don't leave your boss twisting in the wind and then burst in late, smelling like a pissed seaside donkey. 
Toby Wright: Look, alright, I was late for the meeting, Simon, I am sorry, but it's not like I threw up in there, is it? 
Simon Foster: No, you're right, I'm being unfair. I should be thanking you for not throwing up. Well done, you're a star. You didn't wet yourself, did you? You're in the right city. You didn't say anything overtly racist. You didn't pull your cock out and start plucking it and shouting "Willy Banjo". No, I'm being really unfair. You'd got so much right, without actually being there in the beginning of one of the most important moments of my career. Thanks, you're a legend.

Or:

Lt. Gen. George Miller: 12:30. 
Bob Adriano: Hold on. General? Yeah... Secretary Linton Barwick asked me to let you know that his last meeting looks like it's overrunning, he sends his apologies. 
Lt. Gen. George Miller: When will he be here? 
Bob Adriano: I don't have that information at this moment. 
Lt. Gen. George Miller: What the fuck? Huh? Did he stand me up? 
Bob Adriano: No, no, sir. You're more than welcome to wait. 
Lt. Gen. George Miller: Do you know what I'm gonna do? I'm going to take a nice big shit on his desk, just to let him know that I was here. Is that OK with you? 
Bob Adriano: I don't think he'd like that too much, sir.

Or:

Linton Barwick: My golly, I can't see why anyone would choose to work in a glass office, huh? Glass offices, in my opinion, are for perverts. 
Bob Adriano: I could request the glass be frosted. 
Linton Barwick: Frosting is on cakes, Bob. Now, what else happened in London?
Bob Adriano: Ah, generally positive, two glitches... 
Linton Barwick: Really, what? 
Bob Adriano: Karen flagged a report by one of her staffers. She's obviously trying to use it as some kind of roadblock. It's called PWIP PIP. 
Linton Barwick: PWIP what? 
Bob Adriano: PWIP PIP. 
Linton Barwick: What is it, a report on bird calls? What does it even stand for? 
Bob Adriano: I can't recall. It's factish. Intel for and against intervention. 
Linton Barwick: We have all the facts on this we need. We don't need any more facts. In the land of truth, my friend, the man with one fact is the king. You said there was something else, what is that? 
Bob Adriano: In the meeting with the Foreign Office, the committee was accidentally and briefly alluded to. 
Linton Barwick: Which committee? 
Bob Adriano: The... 
[quietly] 
Bob Adriano: The war committee, sir. 
Linton Barwick: All right, Karen is not to know about this, huh? She is an excitable, yapping she-dog. Get a hold of those minutes. I have to correct the record. 
Bob Adriano: We can do that? 
Linton Barwick: Yes, we can. Those minutes are an aide-memoire for us. They should not be a reductive record of what happened to have been said, but they should be more a full record of what was intended to have been said. I think that's the more accurate version, don't you?

Or: 

A.J. Brown: So, you made it in OK, right? 
Malcolm Tucker: Yeah, hunky-dory, thanks. Can I get a coffee? 
A.J. Brown: Sure, sure. If we just get started, my assistant should be bringing in coffee shortly. 
Malcolm Tucker: Your assistant? 
A.J. Brown: Yeah. So, item. We need to have a conversation about the mood of the British Parliament, the bumps in the road ahead and what not. 
Malcolm Tucker: I'm sorry, I don't... This situation here is... Is this it? No offence, son, but you look like you should still be at school with your head down a fucking toilet. 
A.J. Brown: Your first point there, the offence? I'm afraid I'm going to have to take it. Your second point, I'm 22, but item, it's my birthday in nine days, so... if it will make you feel more comfortable, we could wait. 
Malcolm Tucker: Don't get sarcastic with me, son. We burned this tight-arsed city to the ground in 1814. And I'm all for doing it again, starting with you, you frat fuck. You get sarcastic with me again and I will stuff so much cotton wool down your fucking throat it'll come out your arse like the tail on a Playboy bunny. I was led to believe I was attending the war committee. 

These quotes are simply a taste of what is in this movie. Every conversation, every line of dialogue is at par with what you have just read. “In the Loop” more than deserves a nomination for best Original Screenplay.
As far as the performances go, the movie goes the extra effort to make sure each actor has some sure-fire great lines and great scenes. Ianucci seems to have brought along the entire cast of “In the Thick of It,” including Peter Capaldi (Malcolm Tucker), Chris Addison (Toby Wright), Enzo Cilenti (Bob Adriano), Paul Higgins (Jamie MacDonald, the crossest man in Scotland) and others. I hadn’t heard of them before seeing them in this, but they are some very talented cursers and I can only imagine that Britain has much more lenient censors than we do as they have obviously had an awful lot of practice. On the other side of the pond are the Americans David Rasche (Linton Barwick), Mimi Kennedy (Karen Clark), and Anna Chlumsky (Liza Weld). I’ve never heard of them either (but still very funny). The only actors that I recognized were James Gandolfini (Lt. Gen. George Miller), Zach Woods (Chad) from the UCB, and Tom Hollander (Simon Foster) who you might remember as the bad guy in Pirates of the Carribean. Every part in this movie is basically equal making this the best ensemble I have seen in a movie this year. 
As I mentioned before this movie has only one pause in it and it belongs to Peter Capaldi. He has just been cursed out by David Rasche and basically ordered to cook up some intelligence so that the Americans can have something to show the UN Security Council. The camera focuses on Capaldi’s face for a couple of seconds. That’s it and then he swears at the rest of the people in the room and leaves. The movie picks up the breakneck speed of jokes and curses once again. What I noticed is that this sort of running-by-the-seat-of-your-pants pacing not only helps the comedy by keeping the jokes coming but it also explains the characters so much. It is evident that the crisis that takes place is actually quite ordinary. The characters aren’t speeding up to take care of it. They are always this fast, desperate, uncivil and angry. That explains why the only people who keep these jobs are incredible assholes like Malcolm Tucker. The job draws these people because they are the only people who can survive in this environment. Nicer or shall I say less manic men like Simon Foster don’t have a chance. That’s as far as I will get in describing philosophy. I probably went farther than the writer/director wanted me too. His main purpose is definitely not to have us debate politics afterwards but to make us laugh until we have a heart attack. Mission Accomplished.