IN THE LOOP (DIR: ARMANDO IANNUCCI, 2009)

Starring: Peter Capaldi, Tom Hollander, Anna Chlumsky, James Gandolfini

First broadcast on BBC4 back in 2005, Armando Iannucci’s fly-on-the-wall Whitehall sitcom ‘The Thick of It’ has become something of a movable feast, with the first series being followed-up by a brace of hour-long specials and this nimble big-screen adaptation hitting cinemas earlier this year.

Opening out the action from a few dim rooms in Westminster to take in the wide avenues and airy offices of Capitol Hill, the spin this time revolves around cowed, unappreciated British minister Simon Foster (Tom Hollander) whose incautious, bumbling and entirely accidental remarks about the ‘unforseeable’ nature of armed conflict are seized by the hawks in the US Government as a rallying cry for war. Caught up in a shit-storm of his own making, Foster finds himself rubbing shoulders with the Washington elite and under the beady eye of Number 10’s unhinged, scatological attack-dog Malcom Tucker (Peter Capaldi).

The plot, needless to say, couldn’t be more timely, but many viewers will be plugging in for the coruscating wit that illuminated the TV original - and for Capaldi himself. Both are very much front and centre, with the one-liners as sharp as ever and Capaldi on fine form, going toe-to-toe with acting powerhouses James Gandolfini (‘The Sopranos’) and David Rasche (the too-little-seen ‘80s absurdist cop-show satire ‘Sledge Hammer!’) and not flinching once. Capaldi's Tucker is a truly indelible creation and, unfortunately - as with all such characters – proceedings are never quite as lively when he’s not on screen. The TV show was restricted to a few musty corridors in and around Downing Street and even when Tucker was absent, one sensed that he was just around the corner, or the other side of a connecting door, but with the action spread across the Atlantic, his menace – while far from diluted – is not quite as prevalent.

Another minor complaint is that the scriptwriter’s hand is sometimes a little too visible and, moreover, all the characters talk as if written by that same hand – Gandolfini’s General Miller is most obviously disserved in this area, spouting a few too many dainty phrases and bitchy asides than you’d expect to hear from a career Army man.

Nitpicking aside, it’s an absolute treat from start to finish, with more brio than a thousand other comedies and more nous than any British political drama for years – and with another series of ‘The Thick of It’ pencilled in for later this year, there’s every reason to hope that we might be gifted another feature outing for Tucker and co. sometime in the future.