Poor Liza

"Poor Liza" (2000) directed by Slava Tsukerman, and written by Sophia Romma is based on an 18th Century novella by Nikolai M. Karamzin.

The movie, although it takes place in the 18th Century, presents a story of two young people that adhere to the rules of their relative class in society but once their worlds have been fully saturated and engrossed by the restrictions of the hierarchy that dictated to them, they try to break from conformity and to set themselves free. Each new emotional feature which they face negates all rationality as they are drawn to each other. Both Erast (Gabriel Olds) and Liza (Barbora Bobulova) fall into a trap of being enamored by beauty of an outsider, and both are entangled in a struggle as young lovers often are due to their inexperience and a desire for rebellion against societal norms. The narrative in "Poor Liza" and the dialogue exhibits the differences in these two class systems, in the world of the peasants as juxtaposed with the world of aristocracy, there are differences in the soft and harsh dialogues among the varying classes and this is explicitly depicted by the outstanding acting of all the actors in the film. The scenes unveil the core of emotions that each role plays in life, striving for survival under the most conducive conditions, except for poor Liza who falls prey to tragic love. Although, there was an obvious tight budget reflected in the special effects, the notion of life's battle waged by young adults, fighting to sustain their passion against the back drop of a rigid environment and of a strict class system in Tzarist Russia. The war raging in the hearts and in the minds of these young lovers clash with those around them and ultimately challenge their very being, leading to the process of maturity in the realization of how bitter love and life can be.

This international film addresses the question often asked in film "is it possible to have a platonic friendship between an unmarried and woman? ". In this case the man is a handsome rich playboy, Erast (Gabriel Olds), and the woman, Liza, (Barbora Bobulova), is the beautiful but naive daughter of a hard working peasant farmer recently deceased. Liza's mother is sickly but refuses to die until she has assured Liza's future by marriage. Unfortunately Liza has been discovered by Erast who cannot marry Liza because of class differences, but he supports the mother and daughter by buying their farm produce. As a playboy he is not wanting for sexual release so is very careful that while he spends his free time with Liza their relationship is not sexual. Until it is. Then the relationship and his life go downhill, he loses his money gambling and must marry the rich countess who has been courting him. Needless to say, there is not a happy ending.

Ben Gazzara is the main character as narrator and does a nice job. This is a small film but I found the production quality to be good even though it seemed filmed mostly in a studio with green screen. This film is worth the 95 minutes running time.