Rebro Adama

This bittersweet Russian import likely never found an audience after being falsely marketed as a 'sexy, spicy comedy' about three women who 'make love to the Revolution' (whatever that means). The film is actually a quiet, graceful character study of a twice-divorced woman and her two grown daughters, trying to sort out their problems (with men, with money, and with each other) in their claustrophobic Moscow apartment. It's been compared to the working class comedy dramas of Mike Leigh, and not without reason: the emotional moment when the 49-year old heroine vents a lifetime of frustration on her bedridden mother is reminiscent of a key scene at the climax of Leigh's 'Life Is Sweet'. This wasn't the first time director Vyachaslev Krishtofovich was let down by American advertising ineptitude (see 'Lonely Woman Seeks Life Companion'), and the problem here is compounded by the choice of title, with its echoes of Katherine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy. But don't be misled: the film is a poignant and (by new Russian standards) surprisingly understated drama, all the more welcome at a time when the ersatz Soviet film industry was becoming more westernized.