Una gran mujer

You could expect a 1945 Leningrad setting to be joyful after the Russian victory over Nazis, but writer/director Kantemir has caught the downside in Beanpole. It's a deeply moving, complicated story about two former soldiers who tackle the melancholy and desperation of victors with no spoils---just ruined buildings and crushed hopes.

This melancholy drama centers on two women: Iva (Viktoria Miroshnicenk) and Masha (Vasilisa Perelygina), who attempt to bring meaning to their lives after the devastation. Mostly it's about Masha's attempt to have a life within her, mainly a baby. Her first baby died at the hands of Iva, who now owes Masha a baby.

Through a series of lengthy scenes and shots (sometimes they are too long), the audience is drawn into the emotional needs of the protagonists set against the needs of the other Leningrad citizens to gain happiness and hope after a ravaging war. The scenes between Iva and Masha are lovingly and deeply felt as Masha navigates getting a replacement baby and Iva resists the machinations to do so.

Given the wide scope of WWII, Beanpole is a small-scale drama, whose intensity comes from the characters rather than the setting. Love is the operative word, married to hope to make a satisfying character study in a drawn-out drama of human longing, regardless of the time period.

A heavy film, the title does not reflect all the hardship of the war, the incessant search of the two women for survival and personal fulfillment in a sexist and cruel era, deranged by the post-war hunger, and allied to all this drama, the Tall Woman suffers from freezing post concussion and hysterectomy Masha, which makes it incomplete after the loss of the child (which I could swear it was no accident), warm colors, contrasting with the coldness of the war, exceptional drama, intelligent and original script...

This movie is an intense and thoughtful exploration of relationships between survivors of war. The desire to find meaning and love and connection drive people to do beautiful and desperate things, and in the end to find either peace or conflict within depending on what they can accept and create within their minds. Beautifully acted.

This film set in post-war USSR is beautifully shot and superbly acted. Every scene is a work of art that reglects the melancholic mood of that generation. Not a light watch, but extremely rewarding.

Leningrad, 1945. In the aftermath of World War II, within the remaining ruins, two young women, Iya and Masha, try to give a purpose to their meaningless lives. They met at the front during this endless war but they stayed in touch, probably because they felt alone and were desperately disillusioned. They now live in the present, without any perspective for their future that they do not even try to consider. The complete disarray!

Una gran mujer (2019) is darkly sad, with an extremely but deliberately slow pace. If you are depressed before you even consider this movie, you should probably envisage another viewing. Otherwise, this film is breathtakingly beautiful and is excellently filmed. Moreover, the gorgeous actresses Viktoria Miroshnichenko (Iya) and Kseniya Kutepova (Lyubov Petrovna) shine despite a voluntarily sober play.

As a synthesis: 7/8 of 10