This Academy Award-winning film reaches back into the dark past of Stalinism, weaving together personal and national history with Nikita Mikhalkov’s customary sense of irony and allegory. Set in 1936, as Stalin’s purges gather momentum, Mikhalkov plays a retired officer who has retreated to the country with his wife Maroussia and six-year-old daughter Nada. When a former lover of Maroussia arrives, burdened with terrible purpose, the family’s idyll is shattered.
This is my favourite film so far on klassiki. An idyllic summer in 1936, relaxing with extended family is hero of the revolution Kotov. Visiting them is Cousin Dimitri who seems to have ulterior motives for his visit. There is a slow burn which I enjoyed about the film, days lolling around in the sun with the feeling that something is going to spoil it all.