A satire mixing Burn After Reading, Thank You for Smoking, and Burn After Reading, In the Loop features one of the best scripts of the year. The satire alternates between vulgar and witty, yet remains engaging. Sometimes, when it comes to politics, the real dialogue seems absurd. Watching CNN, it seems like there are continuous contentious conversations regarding semantics and superficial details. In the Loop exaggerates this to a point where rivalries within the office become as significant as rivalries between nations.
Under the pretence of high level meetings, cabinet ministers and their staffs are petty, pejorative, phony, and profane. As his wall of his constituency crumbles, as does the political career of Simon Foster based on misconstrued remarks and the political machinations of British and American diplomats. Foster said that war was unforeseeable during a radio interview which is blown out of proportion to the point of absurdity. Like Burn After Reading, Foster agrees not to do whatever he did in the first place again but it makes no difference to his career.
Troop calculations are made during a party on a child’s calculate, the War Committee is so large that it meets on a ping pong table because the original conference room was too small. Aides suck up ceaselessly in order to advance their career and undercut each other. Powerful government officials are inept and insincere but they have created a culture that rewards that type of behaviour. All things considered, director Armando Iannucci has made a clever and comical first film. ***½