The Death of Stalin is a 2017 political satire black comedy film written and directed by Armando Iannucci. Based on the 2010 and 2012 French graphic novel La Mort de Staline, the film depicts the power struggle following the death of Soviet leader Joseph Stalin in 1953. It stars Steve Buscemi, Simon Russell Beale, Paddy Considine, Rupert Friend, Jason Isaacs, Michael Palin, Andrea Riseborough, Paul Whitehouse, and Jeffrey Tambor. It has been banned in Russia and Kyrgyzstan for allegedly mocking the countries’ past and making fun of its leaders.
About The Death of Stalin in brief
The Death of Stalin is a 2017 political satire black comedy film written and directed by Armando Iannucci. Based on the 2010 and 2012 French graphic novel La Mort de Staline, the film depicts the power struggle following the death of Soviet leader Joseph Stalin in 1953. A British-French-Belgian co-production, it stars Steve Buscemi, Simon Russell Beale, Paddy Considine, Rupert Friend, Jason Isaacs, Michael Palin, Andrea Riseborough, Paul Whitehouse, and Jeffrey Tambor. The film was screened in the Platform section at the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival and received critical acclaim. It was released in the United Kingdom by Entertainment One Films on 20 October 2017, in France by Gaumont on 4 April 2018 and in Belgium by September Film Distribution on 18 April 2018. It has been banned in Russia and Kyrgyzstan for allegedly mocking the countries’ past and making fun of its leaders. It received a Magritte Award nomination in the category of Best Foreign Film. The year is 1953, and the Soviet Union is still in the grasp of the paranoia of Premier and General Secretary of the Communist Party Joseph Stalin. During the evening, Stalin convenes an evening get-together at his dacha with Central Committee members Nikita Khrushchev, Moscow Soviet Chairman, Interior Minister Lavrentiy Beria, Deputy Chairman of the Council of Ministers Georgy Malenkov, and Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov. They eat, drink, and watch a John Wayne movie whilst the NKVD begin another wave of crackdowns across the city.
The evening is fraught with disaster, however, as Malenkov drunkenly enquires about the whereabouts of Polnikov, a purge victim, whilst Beria reveals to Khrushchev that MolOTov is on the next list of purge targets. The following morning, Stalin’s housekeeper discovers him collapsed, and a message is telegrammed out to the Central Committee. After everyone leaves, the NKYD deliver the recording to Stalin, who is irate at the time delay, enquiring if they \”fucking walked all the way\” on the way back. He reads it, laughs at the audacity, then promptly suffers a cerebral hemorrhage, becoming paralysed and collapsing in a pool of his own urine. Next is the General Secretary in charge of the Constitution, General Bulganin, before being joined by fellow Committee members. They all reluctantly contemplate where they may find a good doctor, since most have been sent to the gulag. They eventually decide to go to Moscow’s Anastasas, where Beria begins to deploy the Red Army of all security postings, closing off anyone attempting to enter or leave the country. Despite all members of the Committee being there, though, Molotov is noticeably absent, despite the fact that he is on a list of purges to be removed from office. The next day, Beria stole a plethora of confidential documents from one of Stalin’s safes, before handing it over through a window to an NKVD officer outside the dacha.
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This page is based on the article The Death of Stalin published in Wikipedia (as of Dec. 24, 2020) and was automatically summarized using artificial intelligence.
