Intensity overcomes obtuseness

  • By Robert Horton / Herald Movie Critic
  • Thursday, August 19, 2004 9:00pm
  • LifeGo-See-Do

The previous film by Russian filmmaker Alexander Sokurov, “Russian Ark,” was a relatively accessible effort for this seriously heavy director. That movie, made on video and constructed entirely of a single long, unbroken shot, took viewers through the corridors and the history of the Hermitage in St. Petersburg.

“Father and Son” finds Sokurov moving from a grand scale to an intimate one. This film is a companion piece to his superb 1997 “Mother and Son,” which detailed that family relationship to the exclusion of anyone else.

The new movie begins disconcertingly. Sokurov opens with close-ups of two men holding each other in an apparently intimate situation; one has obviously just woken from a bad dream.

But despite initial appearances, Sokurov has not made a gay movie. Although the two men could be mistaken for brothers, this is actually a father (Andrey Schetinin), who is around 40, comforting his son (Aleksay Neymyshev).

The son is in the military, and the father has (or has had) cancer of the lungs. Much is made of the father’s chest X-ray, which apparently shows him to be clear of the disease.

This is about as much as we learn about the two men, who live together in a house in St. Petersburg. The film seems to be “about” nothing, except the general idea that the father is trying to separate himself from the son, so the son can enter the world and be a man on his own.

There’s a girlfriend for the son, or at least a teasing infatuation. We see her in a couple of scenes; otherwise, the film is obsessed with masculine codes and competition. This plays out between father and son but also with the son’s friend, who lives across the alley, and a young man who is searching for his own father.

Many scenes are set on the rooftop of the home, and on planks of wood that connect windows across the alley. Balancing precariously on these planks, which are presumably four or five stories above the street, is a common act of bravado.

I could handle Sokurov’s non-narrative method – hey, he’s a Russian director, he’s allowed to be obscure. But there’s also a level of the movie that feels specifically and culturally Russian, which remains enigmatic.

The sheer intensity of the scenes is enough to carry it through, if the viewer can adjust to the slowed-down style. And the soft, sepia look of “Father and Son” gives it the eerie sheen of an old photo album – one that’s compelling even if you don’t know the people in the pictures.

“Father and Son” HHH

Haunting: Russian director Alexander Sokurov takes a non-narrative look at the intense bond between a young father and his military-age son. An obscure film, probably with specific Russian cultural meanings, but visually haunting. (In Russian, with English subtitles.)

Rated: Not rated; probably PG-13 for subject matter.

Now showing: Varsity.

“Father and Son” HHH

Haunting: Russian director Alexander Sokurov takes a non-narrative look at the intense bond between a young father and his military-age son. An obscure film, probably with specific Russian cultural meanings, but visually haunting. (In Russian, English subtitles.)

Rated: Not rated; probably PG-13 for subject matter.

Now showing: Varsity.

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