Once upon a time, I did a politics degree.  Don’t laugh.  One reason was my interest in social change, and I thought learning about politics might provide insight into that.  Seriously, don’t laugh.  I was young, naive: it happens, OK?  And as my studies continued I realised that social change is only possible when individual change happens, and that’s more to do with issues generally associated with psychology than politics.

Besides, during the course of my degree I got to see some politics in action.  And realised how little what we were studying had to do with the realities of police getting armoured up and chanting Maori-style hakas while clattering batons against their shields before heading out to deal with striking miners.  That was a sight I witnessed when I saw how the police were starting the day while staying at a university hall of residence when most of the students were away on holiday.  And I saw other things, like how pitiful and hate-filled organisations on the left were for the most part.  And what I saw that inspired me came from very different sources.

Which is a roundabout way of saying I’m kind of jaundiced about mainstream politics.  But my attitude is as nothing compared to the vitriol with which Armando Iannucci views the political caste and their machinations.  His vicious humour about matters of state, and the increasing role of spin within them, has been abundantly clear throughout his career as a writer and producer, and now he’s honed that barbed outlook to lethal precision with In The Loop, a feature that he directed and helped to write.

What distinguishes In The Loop from Armando’s similarly textured tv project The Thick Of It is the international scale of what’s happening, with some parts of the story happening in America, and what’s at stake: war.  The feel of what happens is convincing because of the use of handheld cameras and a degree of improvisation: it comes across as very real because of that.  And the insight into the individuals complicit in what’s happening — noone, but noone, is innocent — is as credible as it is scathing.

Much of the dialogue is blistered with obscenities that make you realise both how funny swearing is when done well, and how some people can use it as an instrument of aggression.  The chief culprit is Malcolm Tucker, brilliantly and brutally portrayed by Peter Capaldi, a man for whom there’s no situation that can’t be spun and who no longer has any notion that what he’s doing might be questionable.  But at least he knows he’s a shit, which perhaps makes him less reprehensible than some of the weaker minded individuals who he spins, playing on their desire to be seen in a good light while in their darkest moments knowing that they are but tools.

If there’s anyone resembling a hero in this parade of dullards, nincompoops, psychopaths and powermongers, it’s General Miller, brought to life by James Gandolfini.  Some writers have suggested that he doesn’t match the style of the film, and I can see what they’re getting at.  I also believe that this mismatch is to his advantage, since it’s the General whose compromise — to reverse his dove position and take a hawkish stance — is sincerely motivated by the desire to support the young men who’ll be sent to die as a result of the jockeying and cauldron-stirring that’s taking place.

You can question whether this is a piece of cinema or could have worked just as well on tv, but you can’t question the passion and satirical x-ray vision that Iannucci and his collaborators bring to this hilarious depiction of the machinery of state gearing up for war.  And the fact that Tony Blair’s verminous PR fixer Alastair Campbell says it’s not funny tells you everything you need to know about this exceptional film.