Ryan McNeil
Perhaps the best way to explain the strange days we find ourselves in, is to tell an even stranger story.
IN THE LOOP is a brilliant British satire chronicling a world’s march to war. It would seem as though wars these days are really sparked by one person’s words getting misconstrued. What begins as off-the-cuff musing (with a microphone in front of you) ends up turning into sabre rattling in the time it takes to get to the evening news. Such is life for little-known British Minister Simon Foster (Tom Hollander). After he declares that war is “unforeseeable”, he gets raked over the coals for not walking the company line.
Peter Capaldi is the one who does the raking, and does so in terrific fashion. He has a knack of tearing people apart that sounds funny to anyone watching, but feels like daggers to the one on the receiving end (course that isn’t hard when someone threatens to “punch you into paralysis”).
Meantime in America, the Brits are summoned to attend the War Committee (deviously masquerading as the “Future Planning Committee”) where The American Secretary of Diplomacy and a Lieutenant General (Mimi Kennedy and James Gandolfini) are trying to stave off the warmongering efforts of a Secretary of State so deranged, he uses a live grenade as a paperweight.
Between shark porn, children’s calculators, and walls that won’t stop falling down, IN THE LOOP is filled with subtle absurdity. As if that’s not enough, it brings some very real details into play such as the fact that political aides seems to be getting younger by the day, and that the people who decide our very way of life are helped by people barely old enough to drink.
This movie is amazing, and has rightfully been nominated for a Best Original Screenplay Oscar. As I watched it, I started to think that this is the sort of film Christopher Guest would make if he ever tried his hand at political satire. I also had to wonder about the way a memo for peace gets spun into intel driving the cause to war. This is ‘just a movie’ after all…but in this era where faulty intel has led the march to some horrible decisions, how far off can it really be?
Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to climb the mountain of conflict.
Mimi Kennedy is simply incredible here, and Tom Hollander is so deprecatingly funny.
I thought this movie was ok the first time I watched it, but when I went back to see it again, showing it to a buddy of mine, I laughed so hard I was close to tears and I threw it on my top 10 of the year :). Granted this show fits perfectly into my love of political humor.
@ Andrew… Agreed on both points. I really wish more people would see this movie.
@ Univarn… Part of thinks this is the sort of movie that gets funnier the more you see it because Capaldi is talking so fast, that you need at least two kicks at it to catch everything.
"You sound like a Nazi Julie Andrews!"