The Road Movie

After sleeping on it (writing review one day later), The Road Movie might not work as your traditional story-driven movie, but it may be in 2018 (this edited together in 2016) we need to change how we see movies anyway. In this case, we have what is like live-action cut scenes from a non-plot driven Russian Grand Theft Auto video game. There are no real rules in Russia on the roads by the look of it (perhaps the dash cams are to assist in that the cops make our corrupt cops look like boy/girl scouts).

People get out of cars and into fights; sometimes a car just goes off road into a river for a river-car ride; a car just crashes head on into another and we hear the couple of people saying where they're broken; a guy gets on top of a woman's car as she us parked, and he acts like a mad primate as she drives and is hysterical (he may just be deaf); trucks crash and flip; cows get hit and go on their way; the word 'f**k' is used so often in 67 minutes I think this out-f***s the 3 hour Scorsese crime epics.

The appeal in other words is to be a full witness to the insanity, and while these are taken from YouTube uploads, I think placing then in a short, to the point cinematic context is a nice radical act. It's found-footage when it comes down to it, and at the same time the tone is like taking all of the gnarly bits from Godard's apocalyptic Weekend and none if the political stuff. Human nature in Russia is brutal, unforgiving, and howlingly funny in these videos. At one point a car drives right on through a forest fire (!) that is happening on either side of the road on one hand, and on another a car chases a running bear and all the driver can think to say is to laugh at the bear's defecating. And is that a comet falling to Earth?

In other words, The Road Movie may or may not appeal to you, and I wonder what rewatchability it will have - unlike the insanity of the Jackass films, as one more comparison, there aren't any personalities to latch on to as we are Rear Window-ing as the passengers if these literal car wrecks - but it's a total blast from start to finish and a unique piece of cinema in this decade.

Could there be a more stereotypical look at the crazy Motherland than through a compilation of dashcam videos? Nope, and Dmitrii Kalashnikov, besides owning a kickass name, assembles a bucketful of OMG LOL snippets.

What elevates The Road Movie to actual movie status (and not just a throw away video mash up) is the rhythm, the pacing, and the brilliant commentary. Everyone's familiar with Youtube pavement fails, but when augmented with deadpan, often hilarious commentary (rough translation adds to the effect), the results are mesmerizing.

The Russians are a weird lot, and here's seventy (minutes) proof. Whether following a comet on the horizon, battling a persistent loony on the windshield, or calmly shooting a car to end a road rage incident, The Road Movie has just the right amount of comedic crazy and startling shock to remain watchable past the usual interweb span. You can't look away ... again, again, and again.

Zazdarovje.

"The Road Movie" (NR, 1:07) is a documentary from Belarus and is unlike any doc you've ever seen. It's short for a feature-length film and it has no narration or graphics (except for some words and numbers that appear on the screen), which makes this movie a documentary in the purest sense of the word. It documents. Period. Even more unusual is WHAT it documents - the strange things that happen on the roads of Russia and other former Soviet Republics. That's right, it's a movie made up of dashcam videos.

But it's much more than just a series of spectacular vehicle crashes (even though there are plenty of those). These videos span 2011-2016 (based on the dates on the outer edges of the clips) and they let us see and hear shocking, humorous and bewildering things that happen in the car, to the car and outside of the car - and quite the variety it is - and almost all from the cars of ordinary, everyday people. Throughout the movie, there are the aforementioned crashes - and horrible driving conditions - from fire to ice and everything in between. From a couple different angles, we see a streak of light in the sky. (Is it a meteor? Is it a plane crash? Is it a UFO? We hear drivers and passengers discussing it, but they never find out. And neither do we.) There's a police chase through the streets of Moscow - with an unidentified vehicle heading straight for St. Peter's Square (one of the few sequences from police cars).

And the videos include plenty of clips of people behaving oddly, comically and inexplicably: An apparently mentally ill person jumps on the hood of a car and starts screaming at the windshield. A barefoot young woman who is crying appears out of nowhere, sits on the hood of a car for a moment, and then walks over the top of it. A driver who is apparently upset at the driver with the dashcam comes after that driver with an axe - and then things really get serious. Another driver and his passenger negotiate terms with an unseen prostitute (audio only, but subtitled for non-Russian audiences).

It's all shot from the (usually) stationary, but unflinching perspective of the dashcam (like when a thief grabs one of the cameras and runs off with it - with the owner in hot pursuit). "The Road Movie" is skillfully edited voyeuristic pleasure. It's often surprising, sometimes funny, occasionally frightening and always interesting. Like observing a car crash, police chase or another person even crazier than you, you just can't look away. This film allows us to indulge in some good old-fashioned rubber-necking, in many different situations and without the fear of getting into an accident ourselves or being judged by others - unless of course, they see you watching the movie, but then, they are too! This film is not winning any Oscars, but it does provide a guilty pleasure for those of us who THINK that where WE drive is crazy! "B"

The Road Movie (Doroga) is a fresh and original example of citizen journalism. The people behind the wheel become "street" journalists sharing their dash camera videos. The movie has no an introduction and conclusion. This movie is a compilation of YouTube videos of Russian Roads. It eloquently expresses the metaphor of Russia as a country without limits or end. Additionally, this movie refers a well-known Russian phrase "Russia has two misfortunes: fools and roads." The directing is amazing and inspirational. Dmitrii Kalashnikov makes a contribution to the history of documentary cinema extending its framework. If motion pictures already have plotless structure (some Marvels sequels, Disney series), then until recently documentaries have been rarely exhibited. Kalashnikov, with his movie, increases the capabilities of documentaries, showing that the cinema is not only about embedded stories in written texts.

This could have been titled, " A slice of life on the Russian road."

Why did the woman at the gas station use an open flame to check the fuel level on the car's gas tank? (And did she survivie?)

Did the guy who speed up when the instructor say "brake" do it intentionally?

Did the cops ever catch the guy in the red car?

Was the duck tasty?

Do bears s**t on the road? (Here the answer is yes, for sure.)

Will Dasha and Pasha end up in a loving and eventful relationship? (I sure hope so. They were perfect for each other.)

Questions we'll never know the answer to -- and hoping for a "The Road Movie" sequel.