Review by varturas

This hour and a half movie premiered at the Russian film festival in New York this autumn. It aimed at portraying grass-root, ordinary people that inhabit Russia outside the capital. This film does exactly that, but mostly in gray colors. Maybe too much gray and ordinary. People, most of them work at the local factory, are depicted here as dull gray mass, easily controlled and manipulated. Russian cinema used to have a lot of noir movies, with blood, guts, pathetic characters and miserable finale's, with one central point, To shock audience. This movie tries to stand aside by cutting down on violence. Yet, by loosing all the shocking value (fight scenes look fake, there is no life/death drama), by loosing noir, it turned gray. After all this, I still liked the movie. I liked effect of presence, of being there, in the movie. Actors did a good job at making me care for them. That, and a flask of good cognac.