A film in the spirit of Amelie about a girl with low self-esteem, who was noticed.
I love Amelie, this is a unique film with a simple plot, but a beautiful picture and an interesting narrative. Hoffman's fairy tales, I think, were inspired by this film. There is also a narrator, a similar color scheme and an unusual main character. But if in Amelie it is still something good and touching, then here it is touching, but evil.
Hope is the most complex person, and her mother instilled this trait in her, and all the other heroes only aggravate the situation. The husband is a moral freak who married Nadia only out of pity (although I think he is a natural narcissist, and this type of people usually marry not out of pity, but because only insecure people are willing to groom and cherish such freaks). Garik, who noticed her hands, also does not inspire trust and even out of pity, unlike her husband, Nadia does not want to be with her.
Perhaps, of course, this picture is aimed at about the same as Nadia, to let the soul sing and free itself from the shackles, and then again lock and plunge into a hopeless swamp.
I don't know who would like so much humiliation, gaslighting and abuse from everyone Nadia sees. And the end of the movie is as strange as possible. I don't understand that. Everything was going well, why would she suddenly change her final life and come back? No development of the heroine, as she was a battered mouse, and remained it.
I love Vilkova, she is very beautiful, and I probably don’t really understand why she was chosen for this film as a nasty duckling. But let's say it's some other world where she's considered ugly. . .
Initially, watching the trailer, I was hoping for something kind and sincere, and got something bitter and hurtful. It was beautiful, but the end was disappointing.
A film with interesting color correction, beautiful music, puppet scenery and voiceover. In the center of the plot is a cute and eccentric heroine. We’ve seen it before, haven’t we?
But do not be deceived - our "Amelie" about how for almost two hours everyone is not lazy to mock a kind, charming, naive and complex young woman. They are being bullied especially sophisticatedly and, most importantly, with impunity.
The main character Nadia exists in the timeless space of the Moscow small-town on the outskirts, inherited from her oppressive mother, with no less despotic and, importantly, unemployed and unscrupulous husband Vitalik. The husband, a kind of meme scoof in a greasy coat in an embrace with a TV remote, constantly devalues and reproaches the girl, lives at her expense, and even cheats. At work, a dreamy and modest employee is also not favored. On the set, where Nadia leads “tired Gosha”, he is Goga, he is Evgeny Tsyganov, again playing himself, do not notice. And all this to the delightful music and soft, trusting voice of the narrator - such a mild schizophrenia.
If you like to watch the incessant cruelty, then this is it. I didn’t, so watching a movie like that was really painful. So much so that I spent the last 20 minutes on x2, secretly hoping that the heroine would still be able to love herself and fight for her happiness.
But that would probably be too trivial for the filmmakers. So they cooked something more original than a standard makeover from a dummy to a princess (no).
The result was just a very sad, almost hopeless and unmerciful story under the cover of the classic trope about Cinderella. Very non-trivial, I agree - a "fairy tale" about domestic violence, rudeness and despair. Well, about the fact that if you endure, just endure, then everything will somehow work out.
Or not.
The authors did not do this, but I would add a trigger warning for those who have been getting out of painful and abusive relationships for many years - such fairy tales are of no use to us.
Thank you very much.
An amazing film, an ironic fairy tale on the edge of eras, beautiful shots and non-standard replicas of the heroes - all this captivates the viewer from the first minute.
Special thanks and a low bow for the lines, irony and humor, which are saturated with dialogue and voiceover.
The main character has a completely ordinary life. The girl Nadia is modest, shy and insecure, but touching, knows how to forgive and does not lose faith and hope for the best. By nature, she has thin beautiful hands, which one day the second director Garik (Eugene Tsyganov) notices in the wardrobe and invites Nadia to star in advertising.
He becomes a fairy godmother girl, thanks to whom she begins to notice not fabulous aspects of her life. The heroine begins to ask questions and reflect, while remaining the same modest and kind Nadia from the library.
What's this story about? Perhaps it is about the fact that we can all be kinder and a little better, that everyone has a chance to find themselves and be needed. Lyrical, bright and completely not vulgar film about the fact that there is always a place for a miracle.
This story happened when there were no phones, and when talking to each other people looked into the eyes. And the soundtrack of life were the songs “Disco”, the composition “Anna Magdalena Vocalise”, the songs of the rock band “Hummingbird”.
Dramedi from the director Tina Barkalay tells us a fascinating story about the girl Nada (Ekaterina Vilkova), which is either a fairy tale or a thing.
Hope is a modest, shy girl who inherited curlers from her mother, a small apartment and self-doubt. “If I don’t tell you that you have a high forehead, a face of the color of asphalt” – many other things in this spirit said her mother.
The baton from her mother was picked up by her tamagochi husband Vitalik (Maxim Stoyanov), who constantly arranged psychological violence and parasitized, hiding behind a fictional disease, the name of which he saw in the crossword (cryptomnesia). Not letting the Espander out of his hands, he created occasions to amuse himself and his ego. One day, as a gift, the Espander is replaced by Tamagotchi, where the pet in the game is given the name Aziz. It turns out a double tamagochi: Vitalik looks after Aziz in the game, and Nadia for Vitalik in life.
Our Hope works during the day in the library, where she “cures” books, lulls them in a hammock, and in the evenings works in the wardrobe. One evening, her hands are noticed by a “tired” person. Garik (Eugene Tsyganov) and invites Nadia to shoot in a movie.
And here the plot reminded me of the story of Hope Taffy “Life and the Collar”.
Nadia began to live the life of her hands, but it is worth noting that she sometimes liked it. In her “normal” life, she could not afford much. And here the hands began to demand expensive and different creams, they “begged” to take care of themselves: I had to hire a housekeeper. Thanks to her hands, Nadia fulfilled her childhood dream of dancing ballet with her fingers. After all, according to her mother, she did not fit into the ballet because of the ugly ankles.
Her hands controlled her and she made many discoveries. It didn’t affect her life and she didn’t change herself. Except that she allowed herself frank conversations and introspection out loud. On that she and life-fairy tale that happiness will certainly find you: she becomes an actress in the theater of shadows, where her graceful and plastic hands create miracles and close their own (childish) gestalts.
Beautiful film, great work of director and cameraman, beautiful actors. A breath of fresh air. Encouraged.
I happened to see this movie: there was a screening in the Russian State Library on March 28, followed by a discussion. Knowing nothing about the film itself, or about the director Tina (Tinatin) Barkalay, I just decided to watch a relatively new - 2022 - Russian film.
What's the story about? At first I thought it was like Amelie, but no, the film is completely Russian and completely independent. (Although the director admitted at the discussion that she loves Amelie very much, but here it is, of course, an homage, not an imitation of J. Genet.) The story of a librarian who has very beautiful hands (an excellent work by Ekaterina Vilkova) is both fabulous and typical. Many years of experience in the film industry allowed the director to fill the film with many accurate and vivid details, which gives this story a high degree of external realism.
Typical and real and the heroine herself, and her husband-back in a bright performance of Maxim Stoyanov. Fans of Yevgeny Tsyganov will enjoy his role as the second director, and in fact - to the extent of the beautiful prince, who pulled the already elderly married Moscow Cinderella from the routine of her life into the fabulous world of film and photo art.
The excellent camera work of Konstantin Esadze allowed to create a bright and not glossy reality on the screen.
But what I liked most was the story itself, embodied in the script: a very "delicious" mix of fairy tale and our recent reality (the case takes place at the beginning of this century). Heroes speak with bright memorable non-banal replicas, and the through thread that unites the entire narrative is sometimes lyrical, sometimes ironic voiceover text performed by Alexei Guskov. At the end of the film, we will see the artist himself - in an episodic, but very important role.
But what does Hoffman have to do with his tales? And this is the small but cornerstone on which the story told in the film is built. Smart and, importantly, positive picture, for which the director would like to say thank you very much!