The Death of Stalin

First Hit: There are very funny moments, but I couldn’t help but wonder was his regime filled with that much personal corruptness? Probably.

One of the beginning scenes has Stalin’s chief calling the radio station asking Andreyev (Paddy Considine) to call Stalin directly in 17 minutes. The ensuing discussion between Andreyev and Sergei (Tom Brooke), his co-producer, about when the 17 minutes are up was hilarious. Was it when the phone rang? Was it when he said call him back in 17 minutes? Was it when he hung up the phone?

This dialogue sets the stage about the power Stalin (Adrian McLoughlin) wielded in Russia. Everyone jumped at his every word and wanted to do no wrong or they’d be shot or sent to prison never to be heard from again. They had to get it right.

When Andreyev does call back and Stalin says he wants a recording of the live program he just heard them broadcast, they panic because they didn’t record the concert. So he rushes back into the concert hall, makes everyone sit down in their seats, and perform the concert all over again. Hilarious and pointed in that it notes the fear Stalin put into everyone.

Stalin’s governing group includes his Chief of Staff and second in command Georgy Malenkov (Jeffrey Tambor), Lavrenti Beria (Simon Russell Beale), Vyacheslav Molotov (Michael Palin), and Nikita Khrushchev (Steve Buscemi). This small group with a couple others are all vying to be the next in line and try to create power plays.

When Stalin has a stroke because of a note Maria Veniaminovna Yudina (Olga Kurylenko) sends him, the film then goes to additional funny scenes including Stalin’s governing group kneeling and not kneeling next to Stalin’s body as it lay there on the floor because he had pissed himself was hilarious.

The rest of the film deals with who will get control of the country and how will they do it. It plays through a funny set of scenes around Stalin’s lying in state and his funeral. There are so many funny bits in this film, I’d have to see it again to take it all in, but one thing is clear, what was portrayed was totally possible.

Considine was perfect as the befuddle producer who wanted to make sure he did what Stalin wanted. His questions to his co-producer and then the scenes of how he made the audience go through the performance again was priceless. Brooke was excellent as co-producer who knew well enough to only provide an opinion but not take any responsibility for the concert recording. McLoughlin was wonderful as Stalin. He even looked like some of the pictures I’d seen of him. His casual cruelty was clearly apparent. Tambor was particularly funny as second in command. Always walking a fine line and choosing many different sides as the film went on. Beale was perfect as the plodding technocrat looking for a leg up on the others in the ruling party. Buscemi was sublime as Khrushchev. His slow plotting a takeover obviously worked because he became the President of The Soviet Union. Kurylenko was wonderful as the piano player who instigated Stalin’s demise. Andrea Riseborough as Svetlana, Stalin’s daughter was wonderful. Armando Iannucci, David Schneider, and Ian Martin wrote an engagingly smart funny script. Plenty of history thrown was thrown into this mix of pointed funny scenes. Iannucci did a great job of directing this excellent comedy.

Overall:  This film has enough historical references to make it relevant and by adding comedy a fun way to see history.

The Deep Blue Sea

First Hit:  Rachel Weisz gives an amazing performance in a good and sometimes overdone film.

This film slips time (where a film moves between future, film’s present and past) easily and effortlessly and this is true at the end as well.

However, at times the time slips are perfect and other times, I was annoyed because either I was caught up in the current segment and wanted more completion, or because I was still in the emotion of a previous segment, while we were leaving the current segment for yet another segment.

Regardless, it is Weisz (as Hester Collyer) that we watch. When the camera isn’t on her we want it to be. This is the power a good actor/actress can have when they are on top of their game. Hester is married to an older robust man who is socially prominent as a English Judge.

Sir William Collyer (played by Simon Russell Beale) loves his wife but is inadequate in many ways when you see them together. His upbringing as displayed on a visit Sir William and Hester make to his mother’s home, is tells the whole story. Mean, rude, and unkind, Sir William’s mother is overt in her dislike of Hester.

Hester meets a younger gentleman named Freddie Page (played by Tom Hiddleston) who, full of the bravery he displayed as a English pilot ace in World War II, finds himself a bit lost when he’s home. He hits on Hester at a highbrow club; she bites, and they have a torrid love affair which, for her, is based not only on physical lust, but an awakening of her whole female being – an exposing of her inner passions to feel.

For Freddie, he is carefree. He loves the sex, he loves Hester, but only at a level that leaves Hester sad – his level of caring isn’t enough for her. On the other side, Sir William won’t give her a divorce, and hopes she will come back to him as he loves her more than he can demonstrate. Hester doesn’t feel that feeling with him and at one point says; once you’ve tasted this deep unbridled love, you cannot go back or accept anything less.

Because William doesn’t let her go, she is nearly destitute but holds on to hope that Freddie will come home to roost, to live with and only want to be with her. We follow Hester through her dark depressed emotions and feelings as she navigates her conundrum; she can’t go back to Sir William and Freddie doesn’t meet their relationship at the same level – what’s a woman to do.

This film is darkly shot and it matches the correspondingly dark subject. Unfortunately for me, we there is an overtly and overly loud violin solo (towards the beginning of the film) which was distracting.

Additionally there were scenes which I was the only one in the theater who thought they thought were funny. One such scene was where Hester and Freddie were looking at a cubist drawing of Picasso’s. He made a remark that she said was childish.

He resented this and they got into a huge row in a very quiet museum. As their voices escalated he finally got mad and stormed off. She calls out after him, “where are you going” and he responds with “to the impressionists.”

I thought that was hilarious and laughed out loud. I was the only one. Then later on when the couple was discussing the argument and she asked him why he went to the impressionists, his answer was very funny.

Weisz is superb beyond belief. She probably won’t get recognized for this independent and limitedly distributed work by some awards show next year, but her acting here is brilliant. Beale is wonderful as a restrained man who loves deeply and will probably never find a way to express it because of how he was raised and his position with the government. Hiddleston is very good as the guy who is stuck a bit in the past, is still and will probably always be a boy at heart. Barbara Jefford is killer (in more ways than one) in her brief appearance as Sir William’s mother. Ann Mitchell is great as Mrs. Elton who runs the boarding house Hester and Freddie live in. Terence Davies wrote the screenplay and directed this well. I thought the dialog was amazing and very English while some of the time slipping was overused and distracting.

Overall: A dark powerful film about a woman who isn’t going to have what she wants and it is worth seeing.