How shrewd is the new war satire “In the Loop?”
So shrewd it concocts an entire farce around the build up to the U.S. invasion of Iraq without ever mentioning President George W. Bush, Donald Rumsfeld or any other liberal demon by name.
Call it cagey marketing, since nearly every Iraq War critique has withered at the box office. But “in the Loop’s” brain power doesn’t stop at that marketing maneuver.
It’s a savvy and dense political yarn overflowing with killer lines and performances.
Just never doubt who the real targets are.
British Cabinet Minister Simon Foster (Tom Hollander) has put his foot in his mouth, and he just can’t stop tasting shoe leather. His off-the-cuff remarks about the looming invasion of a Middle Eastern country have set nearly everyone in both the U.S. and British government on edge.
So it’s damage control time for Malcom Tucker (Peter Capaldi), a British strategist who never met a curse he couldn’t twist to his own bitter liking.
Foster’s words set the film’s plot in motion, but they also activate a chorus of shady characters, each with his or her own selfish motives at play.
Doesn’t anybody care about the soldiers heading off to battle, or the civilians about to be bombed into the stone age?
“In the Loop,” from British director Armando Iannucci, adopts “The Office” brand of mockumentary format but bares much sharper fangs than anything ever seen on “The West Wing.”
It’s a battle royale between the hawks and doves on both sides of the Atlantic, with naive assistants like the one played by “My Girl’s” Anna Chlumsky squaring off against entrenched bureaucrats (like comeback kid David Rasche).
James Gandolfini sets aside his New Joisey accent to play a general in the thick of the action, while smaller roles flesh out the mean-spirited nature of D.C.
It’s all so very, very British in execution – martini dry and incisive – but audiences will soon be eager for some breathing room. Good luck with that.
Even a silly subplot involving a crumbling wall threatening a small British hamlet is intensely portrayed.
Naturally, the film tells us nothing about the Middle Eastern country about to be invaded. Inconvenient truths like brutality and torture on a grand scale might dull the message.
“In the Loop” is smarter than “Lions for Lambs,” far funnier than “An American Carol” and just as unbiased as any Michael Moore treatise.
That doesn’t mean the jokes don’t leave a mark, or that even conservative audiences won’t be giggling up their sleeves at the power plays between two western nations.
(Photo: Peter Capaldi, left, makes mincemeat out of a fellow government drone in “In the Loop.”/IFC Films)
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{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
I’m glad you enjoyed the picture. I don’t think it’s quite as deliberately disingenuous as you seem to believe, though. If you look at the BBC series from which it takes off, “The Thick of It,” you’ll notice that not getting specific about any situation the characters find themselves in is kind of the default mode at all times. For the movie, they clearly wanted to paint on a wider canvas—hence, focus on international politics rather than strictly British internecine squabbles—without straying too far from their formula.
I know of that series but haven’t been able to watch it yet. It sounds like a good plan, though … especially since you could watch this film in 2027 and still laugh without getting lost in the period references.
If only all war satires were this sharp … although I think I missed a few lines due to the thick accents (I’ll punch up the subtitles for the DVD!)