Excellent satire

Rating: 10/10 (4 June 2018)

This movie has been banned in Putin's Russia. That already tells you something! I consider this to be the best movie of 2017. A perfect movie that shows the idiocy that was going on in the Soviet Union and now, by extension, in Russia. Satire at its best. The cast and acting are superb. On par with Brazil, but unlike Brazil it is about what really happened. However ridiculous it might look, this is indeed how things were. Even factually the movie is true to the real history. All in all besides a note that a piano player sends to Stalin, the rest of the events in the movie were real, just might have happened not exactly in the sequence or points in time as they were depicted in the movie.
You laugh a lot and do not feel ashamed to laugh at what was truly one of the most horrible periods of modern history. This is how Russians themselves related the events in form of anecdotes to each other (sort of gallows humor, but nevertheless humor). This attitude goes way back. Recall Saltykov-Schedrin's "Chronicles of Glupov city" that provided scathing commentary on Russian history going back to its inception.
To those who don't know Soviet history and are not familiar with the characters it is not as easy to connect and enjoy the movie. But even cursory study of Stalin and his associates on Wikipedia would enrich your experience.