Change Your Image
edwinpace
Reviews
Gitler kaput! (2008)
Great introduction to Russian popular culture--past and present
Despite the low reviews by some here, I think anyone will find much to enjoy in this film. It shows how any totalitarian state is at bottom ridiculous.
Most may not realize that it is also a parody of an old Soviet TV series: "Seventeen Moments of Spring." That the latter was what convinced Putin to join the KGB is more than a little amusing.
That said, it turns all the cliches of the TV series inside out. Our hero begins by accidentally showing a German guard his Party Card--which he then has to cover up with a discreet $100 US bill in his German ID. It's a great comment on contemporary Russian corruption--and the incessant bungling of the much-decayed Russian FSB.
I actually found nothing offensive to the Russian soldiers and civilians of 1941-45. The Nazis are quite properly portrayed as evildoers and madmen. The parody is rather directed at Russian movies ABOUT WW2, that often ARE rather risible. For example, the deadpan offscreen narrator for the hero exactly matches that of Von Stirlitz in "17 Moments," and highlights one of the more annoying elements of the earlier TV series.
With great comic acting and some very witty observations about the shortcomings of (an undoubtedly great) Soviet film industry, this is a worthy successor to such films as "ivan Vasilievich changes his profession" and "Fountain."
Ono (1990)
Ono Review
Saw this many years ago and enjoyed it. Like most Soviet-era films it's now on youtube.
Have a nice visit to Glupov!
Nenaste (2018)
A stunning insight into the Russian character
This is a film adaption of one of the best recent Russian novels, Nenastje, by Aleksey Ivanov. It details the adventures of a group of "Afghantsi," Russians who fought in Afghanistan, after the fall of the Soviet Union. It really gives a sense of the wild 90s in Russia. The Afghantsi try to create their own mini-republic, which flouts the local authorities, and looks for all the world like a latter-day Cossack host. Eventually, however, the group breaks up, its leader is killed, and corrupt businessmen take over. In one sense it is a heist movie, since the action revolves around one member of the group's later attempt to steal a bank shipment, and flee to India. It is the lone hero's desperate attempt to break out of his "nenastye" (swamp) through the bank heist that gives the work its name. The film has important things to say about the deep Russian need to belong to a collective, and the great sense of loss that the fall of the Soviet Union created, and still creates to this day. What is most moving, however, is the fact that the most timid and innocuous character in the movie ultimately revolts and saves the hero. A great story.