Ya lyublyu tebya

Foreign films have an intrinsic advantage in that their milieu in itself tends to have great charm for audiences unfamiliar with that particular country and its people. What we know of foreign countries is largely based on superficial television coverage so when we seemingly are afforded a supposedly more realistic glimpse into foreign cultures, the result has a certain refreshing quality to it. "You I Love" owes it success primarily to this factor. It's something of a novelty to watch a Russian light comedy concerning a bisexual Muscovite yuppie.

While the end result is not more than an amusing 85 minutes the three protagonists have very engaging screen presences, especially the two males in their debut appearances, (according to IMDb).

Very lightweight but not without charm.

I really liked this little Russian movie . . . It's about a love triangle: ad exec, anchorwoman, zoo keeper. We get to see an upscale Moscow couple at work and play, and that in itself is interesting, particularly when an attractive and unsophisticated rural guy is thrown into the mix.

I particularly liked watching the triangle develop. The simple honesty of the young zoo keeper--an Asian-Russian--as he confronts the big city and the object of his desire, is unlike anything I can recall seeing anywhere else. The schism between urban and rural Russia is apparent when the zoo keeper attempts to grasp the concept of an ATM, and when he is enchanted by the ease of turning an electric lamp on and off. While the gay relationship is not shown in an explicit way, the playfully obtuse suggestions of it are fully erotic and believable. The anchorwoman's struggle to keep her man to herself is clever, and again, believable.

There's some melodrama toward the end that is the weakest aspect of the movie. As a plot device, it could have been replaced with something a little more in keeping with the basic concept of the main characters' relationship. Still, it's a plausible story line, and isn't really the main thrust of the movie.

This movie put me in mind of Threesome, a seriously neglected American movie that covers similar ground in a similarly honest and refreshing way. They share an authentic depiction of contemporary love with humor and pathos as equal partners.

This movie deserves a wider audience, and not just a gay audience.

The premise of three people trying to figure out who loves whom, get past jealousy, open to the possibility of love not limited and find joy and fulfillment in sharing their love and making a good life together is not a new one. But in "You I Love" the familiar story is engaging, the humor fun. Even the anger parts and the resolution of those is believable. I never found myself thinking "Right. Spare me!" I never found myself wishing it had come out another way. I don't know the correct word for the way the camera flashed about in between-scenes clips, but it was done so well I enjoyed it, was never distracted by it. Titles were quite readable and in perfectly good English. They moved at a good pace for me. I have already recommended this film to many friends who I know will come out of it thanking me for telling them about it.

Innocently playing with modern Moscow's racial diversity (e.g., an African-American executive in an advertisement agency), capitalism (e.g., an overly clichéd CM: "What is Love?" "Love is Cola!"), and, of course, gay romance, You, I Love proves that the Post-Perestroika Russian cinema still remains refreshingly young. MTV-influenced editing and post-pro techniques boast their variety: the fast-paced-slideshow on the first date of Vera (Lyubov Tolkalina) and Tim (Evgeny Koryakovsky), the mixing-reality-and-dream montage on Vera's reflection during her bathing, and the flashback sequence with fast-paced editing and over-exposure on Vera's hallucination during her physical therapy. The appearance of Uloomji (Damir Badmaev) is annoyingly unsophisticated; this casting choice may be due to producing a sense of reality considering his character, but, hey, this is a slick flick whose other two leads are good-looking as if they were movie stars.

This is a film that easily can be given a long existentialistic interpretation a la Sartre or some similar French philosopher. The depraved and superficial meet the natural and authentic, and in some weird theatrical way the events lead to an unconventional relation. I do not think this film should be viewed as a realistic drama. It is slightly absurd, and even the "bad characters" of the film are more absurd than nasty.

I liked the film for its crazy and indirect and dreamlike approach to unconventional love and relations. No preaching, not that much reality, and a healthy portion of strangeness. If there is a message, then I believe that is best described as "the path to joyful unconventional life is everywhere, just look!"