Despite the Falling Snow

Just watched this movie having previously read the plot online and been semi-excited to watch it. On the whole however I have to say I was left a little bit disappointed.

I've always been fascinated by life in the Soviet Union both during and after WWII and both during the Stalin and post-Stalin worlds, so anything set then is of interest to me.

Things I struggled with however were in the 90's part of the film, who Rebecca Ferguson was playing (I have since gather it's the main character's niece, but as you never see his sister this didn't make much sense) and secondly the lesbian-love angle between the niece the and journalist seems very unlikely to me to be credible. That in particular seemed more of an attempt to place modern values upon the past which is never something I am keen on in a movie.

The plot itself jumps around a bit through the timelines but you can kind of follow it and the ending I thought made the whole thing semi-worthwhile. It's just the middle section of the movie I thought was a bit weak.

On the whole though I think it's worth a watch, but wasn't one where I would ever be likely to want to watch it again.

Found this on Netflix, primarily watched it because of Rebecca Ferguson and Charles Dance. The movie is best described as a quite sedate Cold war espionage / love story in the 60's and the current time and about as far removed from James Bond as possible. The acting is very good as is the direction. Very glad I saw it.

"Despite the Falling Snow" from 2016 is a well-produced film with very good music and a good cast, including Rebecca Ferguson in a dual role as Lauren and her Aunt Katya.

The story is told in flashback. Lauren, an excellent artist, has been invited to show in the new Russia. She intends to go, despite her Uncle Alexander's (Charles Dance) protests.

Lauren knows she bears a strong resemblance to Alexander's wife, Katya, whom he left behind in Russia - unwillingly. She wants to know what happened to her aunt.

Alexander, Katya, and Mischa (Anthony Head) were all spies in the Soviet Union in the 1960s. Katya meets Sasha at a cocktail party. She is encouraged by her handler, Mischa (Oliver Jackson-Cohen), to cultivate Sasha.

While she pretends to be an avowed Communist, Katya hates the Communists for killing her parents and is spying for the U. S. Mischa believes that Sasha will have some good information for her to pass along.

However, Katya falls in love with Sasha and marries him - not what Misha had planned! Does as told. But, what starts as espionage ends in Katya falling hard for the personable and handsome Misha, as he also loves her, and marrying him, much to Misha's dismay. Complications arise.

I found this story slow, and I also realized immediately it wasn't filmed in Russia, and that no one involved with the production knew much about Russia. First of all, it's quite cold there. These people are walking around with woolen coats, scarves jauntily around their necks, and little wool hats. And the clothes were wrong. Not believable.

There was a complaint that the Russians spoke with British accents. I have a question - did you expect them to speak English with a Russian accent? How about that they're speaking Russian, and a British accent, used in Chekov and many other Russian stories, is completely appropriate.

The film moved slowly. The acting was good. I just couldn't get swept up in the story.

When you're cooking and you use ingredients that are 4/10 in quality/freshness, make a 4/10 recipe and put 4/10 effort to details, temperature, timing, etc, you get something that is at best 4/10. You don't need to ask the taster "How would you rate this?" because as a chef, what do you expect?

This is not a commentary on the mediocre Russian cuisine using Soviet era ingredients, but is this production company under embargo or something that they have to do with rations? Could they not have a better script?

Oh wait, the director decided to write her own script, not ask anyone for assistance, and direct everything herself. If your script is good, find a good director to make it. If you're a good director, find a good script to make into film. Very, very few people can do both. The problem is many, many people think they can.

The problem is that a weak director could ruin their own top-notch self- written script with mediocre direction. And a poor self-written script could ruin a great director's film by not getting any scrutiny or passing any filters from idea to finished film.

Let's talk positives first. The soundtrack: 10/10. This is perhaps the best score I've ever heard in my life.

Rebecca Ferguson is one of the most beautiful women to grace the screen and she's exceptionally talented, but eye-candy and great soundtrack do not a great film make.

The other actors were good for what it's worth.

The script, the story, the dialogues, the whole thing is a huge let down. I was looking forward to this film and I can't recommend it to anyone.

It's just not worth watching.

Buy the soundtrack though.

This movie has a lush, romanticized wartime feel. But I wish that it hadn't started in present day though, because in doing so, it diminished some of the intensity and intrigue around the past story.