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The talented bunch of actors ably cut through the surface gloss, but it’s tough to remain invested in the plight of the self-absorbed lead.

Shame

It starts off as brutal but arresting stuff, and the two lead performances are scorching, but disappointingly dissolves into a case of tragedy for the sake of tragedy.

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In The Loop (Film)

by Mark Demetrius | January 19, 2010 11:59 | Edited January 19, 2010 12:05

Unconvincing script and acting compares badly with similar themed classics Brazil and Dr. Strangelove.

This is a supposedly outrageous and hard-hitting political satire. Like Terry Gilliam's Brazil, it follows the snowballing and potentially apocalyptic consequences of one small mistake. Brazil, however, was a great film, and this is just dross.




The trouble starts - for both the fictional world depicted in the film and the real-life viewer - when British government minister Simon Foster (Tom Hollander) refers to war in The Middle East as "unforeseeable." The British PM and the American President want a war, but Foster doesn't, and nor do any of his underlings or advisers. The rest of the film consists of everyone charging manically around, spouting supposedly naturalistic but utterly unconvincing dialogue, in a desperate attempt to avert the coming conflagration.


 

James Gandolfini is okay as a dove-ish American general, but just about everyone else here chews the furniture. The worst offender is Peter Capaldi, who plays apoplectically foul-mouthed communications chief Malcolm Tucker, evidently based on the spin doctor Alastair Campbell. He's not helped by lines consisting of virtually nothing but scatological abuse. Chris Addison is equally and oppositely irritating as Toby Wright, Simon's new political advisor at International Development; he's bland, winsome and yearning to be liked.

 

The action oscillates between London and New York - with both cities being signposted by hackneyed establishing shots - before a tedious denouement in New York. All the while, characters waffle, fail to "click", and argue to no apparent purpose.

 

In The Loop aspires to be both a tense and suspenseful drama and an exercise in absurdist caricature, but succeeds as neither. It's strained, flat, laboured, repetitive, self-satisfied, largely unfunny, and has the drab and tacky look of a telemovie. Dr. Strangelove it ain't.