Satire

Steve Bell - If . . . Bursts Out

Hilarious and hurtful collection of vibrantly satiric strips

19 Nov 2010

(Jonathan Cape) When Ed Miliband was elected leader of the Labour Party, the Guardian website ran footage of cartoonist Steve Bell turning his observations of the new man at the podium into a mocking cartoon. As Bell takes up his spot near the front…

Brüno

9 Jul 2009

Poor Brüno! The 19-year-old presenter with the really hot body from Austrian TV fashion show Funkyzeitung has been ‘schwarzlisted’ following an unfortunate incident involving his all-Velcro suit at a Milan catwalk event. Leaving behind his pygmy Asian…

Jeffrey Rotter - The Unknown Knowns

30 Apr 2009

SATIRICAL TALE This debut novel by a graduate of New York’s Hunter College takes its title from Donald Rumsfeld’s famously bamboozling quote. Jeffrey Rotter may have given himself a high watermark of unintentional satire to live up to, but he…

Chris Addison - It Wasn’t Me

13 Nov 2008

One grotesquely amusing aspect of the current economic crisis has been the sight of our beloved PM desperately trying to hammer home the notion that the predicament should be blamed on ‘global’ factors and is absolutely nothing to do with him, mate. You…

CHEETA - Me Cheeta: The Autobiography

2 Oct 2008

SHOWBIZ SATIRE At first glance it might sound as daft as a bag of monkey nuts. But this ‘autobiography’ of the septuagenarian chimpanzee who became world famous as the companion of Johnny Weissmuller’s Tarzan is actually a brilliantly conceived and…

Curt Sibling - Total Fear: Collection 2

2 Oct 2008

CARTOON SATIRE It’s obvious right away that pseudonymous Scots comic creator Curt Sibling is taking the mickey, but the way in which he does it really has to be spot-on in its execution to succeed. This self-published, black and white anthology takes…

Glen Neath - The Fat Plan

17 Jul 2008

FICTION (Portobello) The trouble with writing a novel satirising the mundanity of life and the mind numbing tedium of bureaucracy is, well, it risks being mundane and tedious. This second minimalist novel from Neath aims at the likes of Beckett…

The Apartment

3 Jul 2008

Billy Wilder’s corrosive 1960 lampoon of corporate America is now so familiar to most people that it barely seems to deserve the time investment that this new print demands. Look again, though, and there is plenty of really surprising stuff in this…

The Aerial (La Antena)

22 May 2008

SILENT/SATIRE (12A) 90min Argentinean writer and director Esteban Sapir utilises the syntax of classic silent cinema to winning effect in this amusing and inventive futuristic adventure. Set in some Orwellian style future city where words and language…

Cluny Brown

22 May 2008

SATIRE (PG) 100min (BFI) Ernst Lubitsch’s famous lightness of touch is all over the final film completed by the master of sophisticated wit and classy style. Having skewered American society with a series of punchy Hollywood romantic comedies such as…

O Lucky Man!

8 May 2008

COMEDY/SATIRE (15) 169min (Warner Home Video) Lindsay Anderson’s 1973 masterpiece is long overdue a proper DVD release, particularly since it’s rarely shown on our television or cinema screens. In O Lucky Man!, Clockwork Orange star Malcolm McDowell…

John Miller - Secret Agent: Chronicles of Doom

8 May 2008

SPY SATIRE (Small Press) You can see the work of Edinburgh cartoonist John Miller on posters and adverts hanging in the city’s Deadhead Comics, but none hint at his proclaimed double life as the template for James Bond, with inspiration imparted to…

Garth Ennis & Darick Robertson - The Boys II

8 May 2008

SUPERHERO SATIRE (Titan) Some 20 years ago Alan Moore asked the question: ‘Who watches The Watchmen?’ Garth Ennis answers the question with this anarchic superhero satire about a gang of super-powered, CIA-backed thugs who police – with extreme…

Fatboy

David Laing

23 Aug 2007

With our current culture of consumerism and our seemingly endless desire to rid the planet of its natural resources, there is unlikely to be a more fitting or biting satire at this year’s Fringe than John Clancy’s Fatboy. An updated version of Alfred…

Fast Food Nation

23 Apr 2007

Texan filmmaker, vegetarian and activist Richard Linklater’s fictional interpretation of Eric Schlosser’s bestselling non-fiction book exposing malpractice in the America’s fast food industry is an enjoyable and shocking freewheeling satire on consumer…