Word: looping
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...with lawns, so with language: the Brits are simply better at caressing and spanking the English language, because they've had so much more practice. The latest proof of their verbal dexterity comes in a crackerjack comedy, In the Loop, which takes the Anglo-American ramp-up to the invasion of Iraq and replays the tragedy as farce. Politics aside, which they never are in this acid, acute talkathon, it's a study of office politics in the middle and upper levels of two large, powerful, troubled corporations: the United Kingdom and the United States of America. No Prime Minister...
...Truth to tell, the Brits get the best lines, and In the Loop sags when the U.S. government's antiwar faction starts macchiavelling. Iannucci & Co. have much more fun with American hawks like Donald Rumsfeld. The former Defense Secretary hardly needs caricaturing; he was his own David Levine cartoon. So the movie's Lynton Barwick (David Rasche) is just Rumsfeld with a haircut, not a lobotomy. "We don't need any more facts," Lynton proclaims. "In the land of truth, my friend, the man with one fact is the king." And he is in control of what passes for fact...
...enjoy In the Loop you needn't know which character is supposed to be what government bigwig; just relax and savor the insults. Every person, monument and company gets a derisive nickname. CNN is "the Cartoon News Network." Toby, Simon's curly-haired, cherub-faced aide, is variously addressed as "Fetus Boy," "Love Actually" and "Ron Weasley." (The last is an apt epithet; as the plot will show, Toby is more than a little weasely.) Chad, a tall, thin lad on the American team, is "Young Lankenstein" and "the boy from The Shining." James Gandolfini plays a dovish U.S. General...
...blunder their way to an improbable victory. But true satire says that the human condition is weak, venal and vulnerable, and we all deserve to blow. The bang that ended the movies, definitive political satire,Dr. Strangelove, wasn't fireworks but the end of the world. In the Loop sidesteps the happy ending, but sitting through it is a hoot: cruel people making funny cracks about life-and-death issues. You'll feel smarter just getting in synch with its hurtful, healing sense of humor...
Visit RottenTomatoes.com for more reviews of In the Loop...