Meagan Ford, National Interest: Moscow Lashes out against Stalin Film
Banning "The Death of Stalin" reflects the current Russian government’s unwillingness to give an inch to Western powers when it can help it.
On the eve of a presidential ballot widely expected to re-elect Russia’s president Vladimir Putin for a fourth term in office, Moscow is once more engaged in a battle with history. This time, it is Scottish writer and director Armando Ianucchi and his film The Death of Stalin—which opened in the United States on March 2—who has provoked official Russian ire.
Ianucchi’s film is set in Russia in 1953 and several of its principal characters are Soviet officials: Nikita Khrushchev, played by Steve Buschemi, Vyacheslav Molotov, played by Michael Palin, and Lavrentii Beria, played by Simon Russell Beale. The movie has been adapted from a French graphic novel and is based on real events surrounding Stalin’s death and the subsequent crisis over who would succeed him.
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WNU editor: When I saw this film last year I laughed myself silly. Because there is a lot of truth to it. And what really annoys these Russian ultra-nationalists and pro-Stalin idiots is that everyone is not only laughing publicly at Stalin and the system that this lunatic put together .... but more to the point .... a lot of this laughter is being directed at them. But truth be told .... there is nothing to laugh about when it comes to Stalin. Millions perished because of his policies, and the horrors that he inflicted on the citizens of the former Soviet Union will be remembered for all time.