Mistaken for a professional contrabandist, a bumbling tourist is given an arm cast full of smuggled goods and inadvertently becomes a government spy after going to the police in this energetic Soviet comedy. Once voted as the funniest Russian comedy of time, 'The Diamond Arm' certainly does an impressive job incorporating various forms of humour. The first five minutes, for example, play out as a dialogue-free silent comedy, but later on there are also pratfalls, sight gags and lines that crack with wit. At its zaniest, the chief smuggler has a red tinted dream in which he is tormented by a laughing black cat (!), though the most amusing moments come from characters narrating their thoughts out loud, whether it be the protagonist's paranoia over a taxi ride or his wife's concern that he is cheating on her. Less successful are the film's attempts at satire - or perhaps this angle is just lost on a western viewer. By some accounts, the film offers a sharp and biting parody of life under the Soviet regime, but ostensibly, it is just an offbeat motion picture about things going incredibly wrong. Yuriy Nikulin (reportedly a former circus clown) does okay as a man out of his depth, wearing the much sought-after cast, but the best moments are had by Andrey Mironov as the actual contrabandist who was meant to be given the cast. Whether it be repeatedly failing to knock Nikulin unconscious during a fishing trip, being kicked in the mouth during a drunken dance or fondling the precious cast, Mironov is simply sensational in a rather thankless role.
Review of The Diamond Arm
