Tag: Cinema of Russia
Unclenching the Fists | Review
So Daddy, I’m Finally Through: Kovalenko Explores Familial Dysfunction in Rural Melodrama
The suppression of women by the heteropatriarchy is tale as ancient as civilization,...
Top 200 Most Anticipated Foreign Films of 2023: #26. Kirill Serebrennikov’s Limonov: The Ballad of Eddie
Limonov: The Ballad of Eddie
The critic elite in Cannes might not have been big (we were) on his Tchaikovsky's Wife, but Kirill Serebrennikov is...
Top 200 Most Anticipated Foreign Films of 2023: #124. Yuriy Bykov’s The Owner
The Owner
A film title that we've been tracking, anticipating and have been in wrong for several years now and what we do know is...
Top 200 Most Anticipated Foreign Films of 2023: #160. Malika Musaeva’s The Cage is Looking for a Bird
The Cage is Looking for a Bird
Russian filmmaker Malika Musaeva won't be on too many radars, but for those keeping a watchful eye on...
Petrov’s Flu | Review
Delirium Tremens: Serebrennikov Maddens with Post-Soviet Magical Realism
Historically, Russian cinema (and literature) always tends to go for broke. Challenging narratives, endless characters, and opulent...
Tchaikovsky’s Wife | 2022 Cannes Film Festival Review
Lady Beard: Serebrennikov Delivers Extravagant Recuperation of a Woman Undone
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, one of the 19th century’s most prolific composers, whose music remains an...
In Limbo | 2021 Warsaw International Film Festival Review
Fetch the Bolt Cutters: Khant Crafts a Story of Liberation, Love and Loss
The relevance of tragic teenage love story is packaged with a touch...
Captain Volkonogov Escaped | 2021 Venice Film Festival Review
Can You Ever Forgive Me?: Chupov & Merkulova Explore Redemption in Scathing, Dramatic Thriller
For their third feature, Captain Volkonogov Escaped, directors Aleksey Chupov...
Medea | 2021 Locarno Film Festival Review
Who Could Kill a Child?: Zeldovich Explores a Fearful Symmetry in Modernized Tragedy
Russian director Alexander Zeldovich’s filmography is something of a curiosity unto itself,...
Sin | Review
A Judgment in Stone: Konchalovsky Mines Michelangelo in Period Portrait
The mental state, rather than the persona of Michelangelo Buonarroti as he struggled to satisfy...
The North Wind | 2021 IFFR Review
Go for Baroque: Litvinova Invokes Her Muses in a Delicious Feast of Opulent Visuals
“Nobody loves anybody and no one is happy,” remarks the matriarchal...
Dear Comrades! | Review
24-Hour Party People: Konchalovsky Examines Propaganda and Protests in Reenactment of Infamous Massacre
Sporting one of the most fascinating filmographies of any Russian (or any...
Fairy | 2020 TIFF Digital Cinema Pro Review
Comrade Christ: Melikyan Muses on the Motherland Through the Eyes of Another Waif
Even through their desperate avatars, the oligarchy overrules the Russian populace, one...
Sputnik | Review
This Time It’s Cold War: Abramenko Revamps a Xenomorph with Effective Potboiler
Just when you think a familiar formula might have run all its potential...
Life After Wartime: Balagov Crafts Exemplary Portrait of Post-WWII Role of Women with “Beanpole” (2019) | Blu-ray Review
Winning the Best Director Prize out of Un Certain Regard at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival (where it also took home the FIPRESCI Prize),...
Why Don’t You Just Die! | Review
The Kalashnikov Sonata: Sokolov Serves Pulp in Enjoyably Nasty Debut
Hell hath no fury like a struggling actress, at least as it’s played in the...
DAU. Natasha | 2020 Berlin Intl. Film Festival Review
The Russia House: Khrzhanovskiy & Oertel Arrive from Russia with Love
As far as the cinematic form has been concerned, there’s been nothing which courts...
Interview: Kantemir Balagov – Beanpole
We sat down with director Kantemir Balagov at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival following the premiere of his sophomore film Beanpole in Un Certain...
Beanpole | Review
Life After Wartime: Balagov Crafts Exemplary Portrait of Post-WWII Role of Women
In the words of Plato, “Only the dead have seen the end of...
Curator | 2019 Warsaw International Film Festival Review
Minimizing Style to Maximize Effect: Levchenko Goes Deep in Russian Murder Drama
According to the Cambridge English Dictionary the curator is a person who is in...
Acid | 2019 Berlin Intl. Film Festival Review
Melt With You: Gorchilin Tracks the Apathy of Russia’s Youth in Agitated Debut
No one gives a damn about their generation until they begin to...
Criterion Collection: Andrei Rublev | Blu-ray Review
“God will forgive you, don’t forgive yourself,” Andrei Rublev is told, the famed Russian iconographer who’s witnessing of the world’s innate and incomprehensible suffering...
Zvyagintsev gets Banished to a Quiet Place in the Country with “The Banishment” | Blu-ray
More exciting than revisiting Zvyagintsev’s 2003 debut is the opportunity to see his neglected 2007 follow-up The Banishment, which is an adaptation of William...
First the Fatherland in Zvyagintsev’s “The Return” (2003) | Blu-ray Review
Russian auteur Andrey Zvyagintsev famously nabbed the Golden Lion at the 2003 Venice Film Festival for his auspicious directorial debut The Return, an allegorical...
Leto | 2018 Cannes Film Festival Review
Goodbye Lenin: Serebrennikov’s Vibrant Time Capsule More than a Feeling
Russian director Kirill Serebrennikov’s on-going house-arrest in Moscow lends his latest film, the period piece...
Interview: Andrey Zvyagintsev – Loveless
A master of complex family dramas, with Andrey Zvyagintsev's latest we are witness to abandonment and neglect via an intense investigation of the family torn apart...