Film

In the Loop

Name: In the Loop
Genre: Comedy
Released: 2009
Cast: Peter Capaldi, Tom Hollander, Gina McKee, James Gandolfini, Chris Addison

A profanity-powered farce about how wars actually start: not with grand strategy but with terrified civil servants, ambitious backbenchers and one apocalyptic spin doctor bullying everyone into a catastrophe nobody quite chose. Peter Capaldi's Malcolm Tucker is a force of nature. It's fast, dense, quotable and bleakly funny about how little control anyone in power really has.

TMDb rating

7.0

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Armando Iannucci's American cousin to this film, with the same DNA of vicious improvised insults and total institutional incompetence, now aimed at the US Vice Presidency. Julia Louis-Dreyfus is magnificent.

But Seven seasons is a lot of cruelty; it can feel relentless if you're not in the mood for wall-to-wall contempt.

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This film's parent show, and where Malcolm Tucker was born. Smaller canvas, same DNA of chaotic spin doctors and hapless ministers, with even more room for Capaldi to swear beautifully.

But British-specific political satire that assumes you know or don't mind not knowing Westminster furniture; some episodes are stronger than others.

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb1964

The great-grandfather of the war-room farce: powerful men sleepwalking humanity toward disaster while bickering over procedure. Kubrick's cold fury is the tonal ancestor of Iannucci's hot one.

But Black-and-white, 1960s pacing, and a very different comic register — cooler and stranger than the sweary naturalism you just watched.

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb poster

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

The Fog of War2003

Same subject as In the Loop — the terrifying banality of how wars get decided — but told straight, by someone who actually lived it and still isn't sure he understood what he was doing.

Errol Morris interviews Robert McNamara, the real-life architect of Vietnam-era decisions, decades later, wrestling openly with how catastrophic policy actually got made in rooms just like the ones in this film.

But No jokes at all — a solemn, single-subject documentary interview, the polar opposite of the film's manic comic energy.

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Proof this joke is close to a century old: that wars start not from grand design but from pride, misunderstanding and men who have no business running anything.

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