I had seen trailers, but never thought I would actually get to see this film, and it is every bit as good as the trailers made it appear. My sole complaint on that score would be that the trailer I saw accidentally gave away the ending, which reduced the shock and the impact somewhat... but that is scarcely the fauit of the film! (I was interested to see from the credits that it was apparently based on a play, which I hadn't realised but can picture with hindsight.)
Irina Pechernikova is delightful as the dainty, secretly rebellious great-grandmother who falls in love against her family's wishes, and Veniamin Smekhov at eighty plays an unexpected romantic role in stalwart support as her love-interest; they make a charming couple, and of course the younger generation can't understand that the appeal of a love-letter is that it can always be reread...
But there are serious subjects being dealt with too. The past is not necessarily a happy place, either for individuals or Russia as a whole, and the film doesn't shy away from that. There is a scene where we even end up feeling sorry for the ungainly, domineering Olga, who bulldozers through life with almost tangible hostility and cannot bear the idea of her mother 'betraying' her image of the family. (She is so resolutely unfeminine and so devoted to her father that it came as a shock to me at least to realise late in the film that she is Dasha's mother; the script only hints at the story that must lie behind that...
Overall this film is very appealing and beautifully shot, with outstanding performances both from the central characters and from those who drop in simply as comic relief; Leonid's son and daughter-in-law are a little one-dimensional perhaps, but Elsa's neighbours are a tour-de-force. And I must give full praise where it is due to the quality of the English subtitles, as well, where creative care had clearly been put into translating the meaning and implications of what was being said rather than merely the wording alone...
This production provides a more than worthy swansong for its stars, and having been delighted to locate it I am even more delighted to be able to say that I found myself glued to the screen, laughed, gasped and smiled tenderly, and all in all enjoyed it very much.
