The Death of Stalin (2017)

In March of 1953, Maria Yudina (Olga Kurylenko) is performing Mozart in Moscow when the hall director receives a call; it is Stalin!  Stalin requests that the director return the call in 17 minutes.  He does so and Stalin requests a recording of the concert, which had not been recorded.  In a panic, the director locks the doors and prevents anyone from leaving.  They will play it again and record it.  This proves to be a comedy of errors as much of the audience escaped, the conductor is incapacitated, and soldiers are standing impatiently awaiting a record to deliver to Stalin.  No sooner has Stalin received the record than he keels over from a stroke.  The following morning, he is discovered on the floor in a pool of urine; he is not dead.  The Council of Ministers must assemble and decide what to do.  Beria (Simon Russell Beale) is the first on scene and he raids Stalin's desk and safe, secreting useful documents and burning troublesome ones.  He has grand plans now that Stalin is dying.  Once all the members arrive, they mill around the unconscious Stalin and discuss options.

A very dark comedy where executions are a punchline, paranoia is entirely justified, and betrayal is the route to success.  Though Malenkov (Jeffrey Tambor) is the next in line to rule, Beria intends that he be little more than a puppet for his own rise to power.  Khruschev (Steve Buscemi) knows where things are headed and starts plotting against Beria.  While Beria thinks his control over Malenkov combined with his knowledge of the skeletons in everyone's closet will trump anything the others can do, Khrushchev wins over ministers one by one.  Throughout the plotting and espionage, they must plan the funeral of Stalin.  Adrian McLoughlin gets a surprising amount of screentime as a corpse.  About halfway through the movie, Marshal Zhukov (Jason Isaacs) arrives and proceeds to steal every scene.  The number of medals on his uniform is ludicrous and yet, to my amazement, is fewer than the actual Zhukov sported.  The reality was too unbelievable!

Though quite entertaining, it plays very loose with the facts.  Beria wasn't executed until 9 months after Stalin's death, not the very next day as the movie paints.  The ministers, especially Malenkov, weren't as buffoonish as portrayed.  In fact, no sooner had the movie ended than I was looking up all the historical figures to see how close it kept to the facts.  A lot of the parts are true, but they have been shuffled around to make for a more exciting movie.  What really surprised me, especially seeing how common executions had been, was that all the survivors lived long lives, even after being forced out of government.

Molotov, who was on a list to be executed and was only spared on account of Stalin's death, lived to be 96 years old, dying in 1986.  Khruschev was forced out by Brezhnev in 1964 but lived a quiet life until he died in 1971 at 77.  Malenkov lived to the ripe old age of 87.  Marshall Zhukov died at 78.  Clearly, the death of Stalin and Beria led to longer lives among the elite.  Of particular surprise, Svetlana, Stalin's daughter, defected to the United States in 1967 and died in Wisconsin in 2011.  How did I not know that?

Great popcorn fun but not to be confused with actual history.  Highly recommended.