You might think The Death of Stalin was a parody or a black comedy or a farce. We know that the actors are playing actual people some of whom lived until the late 1980s. The weird thing is the actual events depicted in the movie happened in some form.

In real life, when Stalin was lying on the floor in his soiled pajamas after he suffered a stroke. They needed to call a meeting to decide whether to call a doctor. Stalin's personal physician was unavailable as he was being tortured at the time for suggesting Stalin needed more bed rest.

Armando Iannucci mines comedy gold in an absurd, surreal, darkly violent tale of who wants to be the next leader of the Soviet Union. It is not a historical tale, it is a story of what can happen in any society where dogma and the bullet become the main currencies.

"The Death of Stalin" is a somewhat fact-based film. In other words, it tries its best to recreate the events around the time of Stalin's death, though the sources aren't exactly unbiased or 100% truthful....and sometimes the writers needed to infer what was said and done behind closed doors. Look at it as the best guess as to the events instead....and in this sense and many others the movie is marvelous and very well made.

The story begins shortly before Stalin's death from a cerebral hemorrhage. The machinations before and especially after are what is intriguing about the story....and how various evil scum surrounding Stalin all vied for power after his demise. It culminates with a very vivid and bloody scene...of a man who truly deserved his fate but watching it is NOT for the faint of heart.

Apart from a bit of violence that might be off-putting (after all, the Stalinist regime was one of the most brutal and bloody in history),the film is a delight to watch. Excellent acting, amazing makeup and an interesting story all work together to make a really exciting film...well worth seeing.

Joseph Stalin rules the Soviet Union with an iron fist. He produces a constant stream of enemy lists which his soldiers round up nightly. He is surrounded by yes men. After a laughable threat from pianist Maria Yudina, he has a stroke. Soon, he's dead and various leaders struggle for dominance. The most ambitious are Nikita Khrushchev (Steve Buscemi) and NKVD head Lavrentiy Beria. Molotov is the fumbling Foreign Minister. Field Marshal Zhukov is the bombastic war hero. Svetlana and unstable Vasily are Stalin's children. Beria uses his secret police, stealing Khrushchev's liberal reforms, and blackmail with Khrushchev's mistress Yudina's threatening note.

This political satire has a few funny moments. It's oddly light in a dark world. That's the central problem which holds it back. The historical events are dire. The dictatorial police state is apocalyptic. This movie tries to have some light fun with it. The clash between comedy and reality is never far from the surface. The other issue I have is that Buscemi always looks like Buscemi. He never strikes me as Khrushchev. I see the historical Khruschev as a big, boisterous gangster. Buscemi always looks little. I can't see him as Khrushchev. This has plenty of quirky fun but those couple of things keep pulling me out of the movie.