Est-Ouest (East-West)
Sunday,
January 27, 2002 McGuinn 121, 4 p.m.
In
1946, Stalin launches a propaganda campaign to lure back to the Soviet Union the
Russian émigrés who fled to the west during the Communist revolution. He
offers them amnesty and the chance to take part in the reconstruction of the
country. Al
exeï returns with his French wife, Marie, and their young son, only
to find that they have walked into a trap: many of the returnees are imprisoned
or shot. Being a doctor Alexeï fares better than
most,
but conditions in which
the family must live are harsh. Marie wants to escape, but Alexeï favors lying
low and avoiding suspicion. Frustrated with one another, and under the
increasing pressure of being spied upon by neighbors, each takes a lover. Marie
throws Alexeï out and embarks on a scheme to return to France, thereby putting
the entire family in jeopardy. Employing a cold-war style political angle to
heighten the melodrama, the film focuses tightly on a family unit and evokes the
all-pervasive atmosphere of mutual suspicion in Stalin’s Soviet Union,
revealing the systematic erosion of personal relationships.
Cast: Sandrine Bonnaire, Sergei Bodrov Jr., Oleg Menchikov, Catherine Deneuve.
Running time: 119 minutes
Year of production: 1999
Rating: PG-13