On the northern coast of the Russian Kola peninsula, bordering the infamously tempestuous Barents Sea, lie half-abandoned army bases, their mossy constructions turning ghostly in opposition to the silver-grey winter sky. Trying extra like a setting for a post-apocalyptic sci-fi movie, the world hardly resembles a super place to place down roots. Nonetheless, Ilya Povolotsky’s otherworldly documentary exhibits a small, idiosyncratic group striving to steer significant lives on this inhospitable atmosphere.
Whereas these uncommon souls hail from completely different backgrounds, all of them look like dwelling exterior the modern course of historical past. Former marine Bardak spends his autumnal years squatting in a rundown constructing despite the fact that his friends opted to maneuver to the cities. Center-aged Alexander operates a quasi-water bus service, a métier he hopes his teenage daughter Masha will inherit. Nonetheless, the younger woman is extra grounded on land: one significantly spirited sequence finds Masha sprinting along with her good friend round a shopping center, the place engaging window shows trump the solemn austerity of her father’s cabin.
In distinction to those that are preoccupied with the previous – together with a ragtag group of beginner divers with a ardour for recovering second world battle boat wreckage – Dima is an adrenalin-seeking poacher engaged on the fringes of the legislation. Povolotsky deliberate to stage and shoot a sea chase, just for Dima to be pursued by actual coast guards; that is the place the road between documentary and fiction will get blurred, for dramatic impact. The threading collectively of the completely different tales is overly opaque at instances, however Evgeny Rodin’s atmospheric cinematography is a marvel, imbuing a Tarkovsky-esque ethereality to a land that has fallen out of step with the trendy world.
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