Ya lyublyu tebya

Foreign films have an intrinsic advantage in that their milieu in itself tends to have great charm for audiences unfamiliar with that particular country and its people. What we know of foreign countries is largely based on superficial television coverage so when we seemingly are afforded a supposedly more realistic glimpse into foreign cultures, the result has a certain refreshing quality to it. "You I Love" owes it success primarily to this factor. It's something of a novelty to watch a Russian light comedy concerning a bisexual Muscovite yuppie.

While the end result is not more than an amusing 85 minutes the three protagonists have very engaging screen presences, especially the two males in their debut appearances, (according to IMDb).

Very lightweight but not without charm.

The premise of three people trying to figure out who loves whom, get past jealousy, open to the possibility of love not limited and find joy and fulfillment in sharing their love and making a good life together is not a new one. But in "You I Love" the familiar story is engaging, the humor fun. Even the anger parts and the resolution of those is believable. I never found myself thinking "Right. Spare me!" I never found myself wishing it had come out another way. I don't know the correct word for the way the camera flashed about in between-scenes clips, but it was done so well I enjoyed it, was never distracted by it. Titles were quite readable and in perfectly good English. They moved at a good pace for me. I have already recommended this film to many friends who I know will come out of it thanking me for telling them about it.

This is a film that easily can be given a long existentialistic interpretation a la Sartre or some similar French philosopher. The depraved and superficial meet the natural and authentic, and in some weird theatrical way the events lead to an unconventional relation. I do not think this film should be viewed as a realistic drama. It is slightly absurd, and even the "bad characters" of the film are more absurd than nasty.

I liked the film for its crazy and indirect and dreamlike approach to unconventional love and relations. No preaching, not that much reality, and a healthy portion of strangeness. If there is a message, then I believe that is best described as "the path to joyful unconventional life is everywhere, just look!"

This film reminds us of "Sex and the City", but with the city being Russia's capital.

Showing us a very stylized Moscow (as "SEX" does with New York), the movie spotlights the private lives of 3 main characters in a modern take of now "liberal" Russia. Two of them have glamorous lives and careers, affording us viewers locations (luxury apartments, offices, bars, and so on) to match; a global, thoroughly Westernized side of Moscow we rarely see on film.

The third character is from the Asian part of Russia, throwing in some gritty reminders about how others, especially racial minorities, live in Russia. This character's family, predictably, is more conservative and closed minded than the other more "European" characters. This character and his family also remind the audience of Russia's multi cultural nature.

Minor characters inter related to the main three complete the mosaic of modern day Moscow the film paints. Each is a composite of stereotypes -a foreign multi national executive, two senators (the three living similar hedonistic lifestyles), young people with aspiring consumer driven dreams; all but the "Asian Russians" quite capitalistic.

While not revealing any particularly novelty, the film is interesting to Westerners as a glossy display of Moscow life, with the stereotypes we read about in the press, and hear about in World News, brought to life on screen.

The basic plot however confirms (at least to me) that Moscow is not yet that up to date and permissive. The main relationship formed is a compromise with the conservative reality of Russian morals, and I think not very realistic in any society.

One may infer from this film that progressive trendy Muscovites can accept bisexuality, but not real homosexuality. This film makes it clear that it's OK to be gay if you're really bisexual. At least, that's a start for this conservative society. But it is not what (I believe) most of the film's target audiences are expecting to see. In the end, the message the film sends is a cop out.

I have read on a previous post something like director-writers Olga Stolpovskaja and Dmitry Troitsky seemed more to be issuing a statement about a westbound, tolerant, more modern Russia than committing to a significant, if not merely credible storytelling. And that's just the tip of the iceberg; I saw it all in order to review it.

To make a long story short: the movie's unskilled actor direction, the ludicrous resolution of its plot, and clamorous potholes in screen writing, editing, photography, etc make this an excellent choice for undemanding audiences who, yes, believe its statement and pay for theatre tickets. Which in the end is, probably, what matters to some.