The Playlist

It's rare when a debut film is anything but amateur, few nail a "Blood Simple" or "400 Blows" at first swing. Even those that are mediocre "show promise," and those that reveal a sign of brashness are "future cult classics." So how is it that British satirist Chris Morris' first film "Four Lions," a comedy following a Jihadist cell, is not only hilarious and ballsy, but works really well? Truth be told, it could be his years of experience in the biz -- starting off as a disc jockey, he worked on many radio shows and later in television, including "The IT crowd" and "The Day Today," which featured a very young Steve Coogan. It wasn't until 2002 that he approached film-making, directing the short "My Wrongs #8245-8249 & 117" based off of a comedy monologue he had included in a previous show. It proved he was a force to be reckoned with, as it collected the best short BAFTA and kicked off Warp Records' film joint, who have birthed some great films including Shane Meadows's "Dead Man's Shoes" and his break-out "This is England." After a brief siesta, Morris decided he was unable to shake the cinema bug, and he finally hit back with the charging farce "Four Lions," which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival to much fervor. Though it certainly feels like his TV background rubbed into the feel of the film, its humor is near impeccable and it offers more depth than your average comedy. We recently sat down with the man behind the very first terrorism-comedy, and after a healthy discussion of Opie and Anthony, Howard Stern, and "Observe and Report," we got down to brass tacks.