spoilers

who remembers beach cinema? I do. It was epic & that was the first time i had ever seen Death of Stalin & my friends kept asking me questions about it & it was freezing so this time around i was looking forward to properly concentrating on it & being like oooooh film. I mean no offence to my friends i love them, but dont ask me questions about a film ive never seen before until its actually over please. So this time knowing what to expect i was looking forward to watchign this genius at work & properly appreciating it knowing what i was letting myslef in for (& not being frozen).

If you want to see what my initial thoughts were a few years ago at beach cinema you can click here & see what i said. Although lets be honest when i wrote that up then i said i liked it but now with my understanding i bloody love it so were just going to go over a few more points here.

I mean its just farcical isnt? I mean not just the film & Armandos vision for the film & the way his humour is perfect, but the whole idea of those protocols when Russia & the Soviet union were like that. You sit there & laugh at it all as its a dark comedy but you sit there & go these things actually bloody happened in real life to some extent & its madness. & that is why it works.

& i love the shift in tone when the man who steals the show turns up. Yep everyone wave & say Hello to Jason Isaacs, when he turns up & throw his coat of you just go yes mate bring it on. & the film completely changes as you know shits going to go down.

The Ice Hockey team are all dead before the winter olympics & everyone gives a shit about it & then they dont. Wonderful its like a little in joke that you all know that would be a huge thing if Stalin hadnt died.

The fact they get everyone back for the opera performance so they can re record it is brilliant. Something so small but again has a huge impact later.

Stalin was going for the Sheriff of Nottingham amount of time to die wasnt he. He kept coming back then dying then being out cold then fine then properly dead. ( by the Sheriff i mean Rickman, Mendelsohn when he played him was dead very quickly)

Did they really kill all the staff that worked for him seriously? I mean it is Russia so.

all those meeting which are meant to be a democracy are brilliant when they are all forced to vote for the person who said it. Yeah i can imagine that happening.

The lying in state, the flowers & the scuffles that happen all because of that one day are madness & its my favourite part of the film how mad it is & how they are all meant to be being respectful but they are all just back stabbing each other & plotting revenge.

That end Death was all very quick & sudden & dealt with wasnt it. You laughing at the chaos & everything thats going on & Then bang hes dead.

I just laughed throughout. I just really enjoyed it & if you like Iannucci you will really get this & enjoy it. Know a little bit about Stalin & the regime first to see why some bit are so uncomfortable & then some bits are so bloody funny. Its a joy to behold. Much better a second time round, i can answer my friends questions now.