Armando Iannucci mocks Brexit during European Film Awards

Armando Iannucci lambasted Brexit during an acceptance speech at the European film awards, after his film The Death of Stalin won Best Comedy Film of 2018.

The writer-director noted the European credentials of his film: he is Scottish and Italian, production mostly took place in England, the film had French financiers, and post-production took place in Belgium.

“It just shows what a good idea it is for countries to co-operate together and work with the British in, let’s call it a European community, a European union. It worked very well, I’m going to take that idea back to the United Kingdom,” he said, according to The Guardian.

Based on the French graphic novel La mort de Staline, the film satirises the power struggle which occurred following the death of Soviet leader Joseph Stalin in 1953.

Ralph Fiennes, accepting a special award for his contributions to cinema, said that it was "distressing and depressing" to witness the debate in the UK "about who we are in relation to Europe." He added: "In England now there is only the noise of division."

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The Death of Stalin is witty, but held back by an outsider vision

He added that film, however, has been able to celebrate “our differences of language, culture, custom, and our common humanity." He continued: “I believe film-makers are unifiers. Our work is by definition collaborative, it has to be to survive.”

The biggest winner at the ceremony was Poland's Cold War, directed Pawel Pawlikowski. A love story set during the 1950s, the film won five awards, including Best Film, Best Screenplay, and Best Director.

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