Late dates. In Soviet cinema, films about the love of elderly people who suddenly experienced an almost forgotten feeling were periodically released. Among such pictures can be called such wonderful films as “Old-fashioned Comedy”, “Sold, sold, charm”, “I still love, still hope” and some others. In modern Russian cinema, there are almost no such tapes, since the producers believe that they will not have commercial success. After all, now the movies are mostly teenagers who are unlikely to want to watch the drama from the lives of people who are suitable for them as grandparents. One of the few exceptions was the painting by Larisa Sadilova “Ogorod”, which resembles the best examples of Soviet cinema, telling about the everyday life of the most ordinary people.
The main character of the picture is a pensioner Zoya, who is almost seventy years old. Her children have long become adults and live their own lives, and Zoya, left without a husband, devotes her life to work in the garden and health care. She is quite satisfied with her usual life, which she categorically does not want to change. But one day Zoya comes to a sanatorium for patients with heart disease and meets his peer Valery there. Young people are drawn to each other, but their happiness is hampered by the fact that Valery is married, although his marriage has long been a formality. In order not to put Valeria before a difficult choice, Zoya leaves the sanatorium, returns home, where she lives with her younger sister, and does not answer the calls of her new friend. Life seems to be entering the usual rut, but even a year later, older people still can not forget each other. And then Valery finds Zoe's address and without warning comes to visit her.
All these melodramatic passions unfold against the background of the daily life of a provincial city somewhere in the Bryansk region, where life has not changed too much over the past half century. As before, the heroes weed beds, collect mushrooms, ride in trains, and in the evenings watch the series on TV. Sometimes they attend neighborhood weddings, sometimes they listen to the confessions of random fellow travelers. Perhaps the only sign of modernity are smartphones, and the rest before us all the same repeatedly described in the literature and shown in the movies provincial Russian life. The role of Zoe is very organically performed by the star of Soviet cinema Valentina Telichkina, and Valeria was played by the artist from Kursk Yuri Kutafin, for whom the film was the debut. At the same time, he is not inferior to his eminent partner. And many episodic roles were not played by actors, but by real locals.
Probably, many young viewers, accustomed to action movies and thrillers, this film without tricks and special effects can seem boring and old-fashioned. But it will be appreciated by people who want to see a simple, touching, unhurried, quiet, subtle story not so much about love as about the longing for intimacy, which is now so badly lacking for many.
7 out of 10