SYNOPSICS
4 (2004) is a Russian movie. Ilya Khrzhanovskiy has directed this movie. Yuriy Laguta,Marina Vovchenko,Sergey Shnurov,Andrei Kudriashov are the starring of this movie. It was released in 2004. 4 (2004) is considered one of the best Drama,Mystery,Sci-Fi movie in India and around the world.
Meat merchant Oleg, prostitute Marina, and piano tuner "simply Volodya" drop into an all-night bar in Moscow, where they are served by a narcoleptic bartender (three plus one is four) while each regales the others with made-up biographies. Oleg claims to work in President Putin's administration, supplying him with bottled water and his wife with liquor; Marina passes herself off as a marketing executive; and Volodya, the infamous lead singer of the rock group Leningrad, as a geneticist who clones twins (two times two makes four, again) in a laboratory that has been engaged in these experiments since the days of Stalin. After they separate, these fantasy realities, especially Volodya's, begin to dominate their everyday lives.
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4 (2004) Reviews
The most weird thing
I've seen this film some weeks ago. When i came out of the room, I was disturbed. The first hour is pleasant, showing us a funny conversation between three persons who are tying to create something interesting about their being. Then, the long trip in the strange land where degenerated old ladies live is mind shocking, repetitive and hard to see. But the effect is clear. When you felt the isolation, the promiscuity watching Dogville, Chetyre gives you the same medication with a ten times harder concentration. A few weeks after seeing it, you keep a clear and screeching memory. This film is an experience, it brings something different, some points of view are bothering, but a strange feeling added to gorgeous landscape remain in your head after seeing it.
Involving, Varied
Was this Andy Warhol's "Pets or Meat" ? or Henry Jaglom's "Motel Hell"? Possibly Mike Leigh's "Night of the Living Dead"? Anyway, this film has my nomination for best ever use of clones with crones, and also for best use of crones overall. Did you know that if you play this film it matches up very well with Mussorgsky's "Night on Bald Mountain"? No? Well maybe it doesn't but it should! Try it! I found this film consistently involving even though it became increasingly unpleasant and difficult to categorize or interpret. It appeared to have two distinct halves, each with different pacing and tone. The lively and stimulating first half took place in the city (Moscow?) and showed the stories of several characters unfolding. The 2nd half focused on one character and a separate set of people she knew in the country (until the very ending bits). This 2nd half was more claustrophobic, squalid, and disturbing. After the Seattle 2005 screening during the Q/A session with the director, one Russian woman ranted at him for an act of "treason" in this disturbing portrayal of Russian life, and said it and he were "dirty!", asking him where he lived *now*, he must have been well paid for this, etc. He responded that unlike her he still lived in Russia, that in fact life was *harder* than he portrayed and that Russians drank *more* than he portrayed, etc. After she walked out, he explained that her reaction was typical of the culturally *soviet* people in Russia, who were brought up to always present the best face of Russia at all times.
Excellent movie, but not for everybody
For me, it is one of the best Russian movies of the year 2005. It takes to what is called "collective unconscious" - but I guess only if y're Russian about 30 y.o. living in large city:) I was really amazed by Ilya Chrzhanovsky's astonishing work because it's his first full-length movie. Vladimir Sorokin, who wrote the script, is very scandalous author who loves to shock audience. Besides, he is obviously postmodernist, so his stories are always full of different layers of meaning, contain a lot of symbols. Often you can't understand for sure whether he is kidding or being serious. The last but not the least, the movie is brilliant at camera work and has an amazing soundtrack.
Not a great date movie- unless your date is insane
Don't worry, I'm not going to give away the ending- couldn't even if I wanted to. Not really sure what the ending was, the screen went black & the house lights went up but that was the only clue I had the the "story" was over. Let me put it this way- during one scene an entire row of people got up and left muttering things like "This isn't a movie! I don't know what this was but how dare he!" and "Go back to Russia" That's when I knew that the director was really on to something. Again, not really sure what he is on to or into for that matter but this movie is definitely worth seeing. It's beautifully shot, one scene more enthralling than the previous one, the acting is great especially since I don't think any of the actors are actually actors & the sound & music brought on an acid flashback. All pluses in my book. It's not for the faint of heart or vegetarians. Good luck. (FYI- my spell check tells me that I write at a 6th grade level so what do I know-)
A young generations defiant social commentary at Russias past and present
Telling three peoples stories that meet in a late night bar "4" shows two different sides of contemporary Russia. Moscow, which stands as a symbol for modernism, globalism and Russia's post soviet present and future, and a village outside Moscow in the countryside where the "old" Russia is at home. A small population of village people is trying to survive by selling hand made puppets to unnamed buyers. Along with the story of one of the people in the bar who unwillingly shares a flat with his age old father this major part of the film deals with Russia's post war generation who is left to age and die unable to be of any more use to modern Russia anymore, masterfully visualized by portraying father and son in a master - servant relationship in another of the film's episodes. The abandoned old generation, defunct families and the refusal and alienation of the younger generation with its elders traditions are one of the major topics of Chetyre. The extreme length and detail and explicity in which certain scenes are shot make this film tough to watch for some people. Russia is going through a tragic change. The film reflects this change in its use of sometimes painfully repetitive or over length narrative and the sheer excessiveness of some scenes. Nevertheless these elements fulfill it's purpose of delivering a social commentary that will make the audiences think long after the curtains have been lowered. Rough, brutal and politically incorrect and a testament to Russias volatile times shown from the stand point of a young Russian generation that refuses the old set of rules and struggles to find its own values. Incredibly strong in some instances I consider this film as equally powerful and provocative a piece as Eisenstein's Tankship Potjemkin could have been in it's time. A brave movie that is meant to stimulate and polarize.