vitalyshilo

Let's say it's a second rate TV film. It's interesting for several reasons - two excellent actors, Galina Orlova (who, unfortunately for the woman of such beauty and talent, played only one major movie role three years later) and the great comedian Vladimir Etush save it. Most other actors, including Ludmila Gurchenko (she was virtually banned from filming at that period, so she had to earn her bread) are colorless or too plain. It was filmed in Riga (lots of nice city footage, interesting old cars) and based on an obsolete Soviet operetta from 1960. So this film contains a lot of 50s-style singing, dancing, also interesting footage of old Soviet circus. As in many other Soviet films, the "foreign country" where it's placed is actually a kind of a fairytale land, populated with greedy capitalists, naive poor youth, stupid villains, and throwing all cultures from Spain to Turkey into one weird mixture. Those who like the country in "Chelovek-Amfibiya" or "Brilliantovaya Ruka" may also like this. Well, it's a fairytale ...extremely naive but also extremely kind, and the movies will never be like that again.

People are usually divided concerning this Ryazanov movie. It's rather hard for an unprepared watcher and many, including Nikulin himself, did not like it. But it's an important milestone both in Ryazanov work as well as in Soviet cinema. Not everyone can read behind the lines, but it's a very deep social and moral satire. Already in this movie Ryazanov made a decisive step towards tragicomedy. Nikulin as the honest and very naive detective actually parodies his former "Gorbunkov" impersonations, coming close to grotesque. The final trial scene is excellent and surrealistic. Short contributions from Andrey Mironov, Georgiy Burkov are excellent. Olga Aroseva was know as TV comedy actress before this movie, and this film makes some insight into her deeper personality and talent. The film is also famous for showing the medieval architecture of Lvov and old vintage trams on its streets.