Babusya (2003)

User Rating:

7.2/10   

Director:

Lidiya Bobrova

Writer:

Lidiya Bobrova (writer)

Release Date:

4 February 2004 (France)

Awards:

11 wins & 2 nominations

Cast

Nina Shubina	...	Babusya
Olga Onishchenko	...	Liza
Anna Ovsyannikova	...	Anna
Vladimir Kulakov	...	Viktor
Sergei Anufriyev	...	Nikolai
Yuri Ovsyanko	...	Ivan
Valentina Cherkozyanova	...	Valentina
Mariya Lobachyova	...	Taya
Sergey Gamov	...	Tolik
Tamara Tsyganova	...	Masha
Polya Tilge	...	Olya
Sergei Kabanovskiy	...	Leonid
Pavel Derevyanko	...	Viktor's Friend
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Vladimir Baranov

Also Known As:

Бабуся (Russia)
Baboussia (France)
Granny (International: English title)

Runtime:

97 min

Country:

Russia | France

Language:

Russian

Color:

Color

Company:

Lenfilm Studio

How could the old Russia have raised the new Russians?

This is a made-for-HDTV film, and it shows. The cinematography itself is not great either, and the acting and direction are highly uneven (The title role is admirably played by Nina Shubina, but most of the cast is non-professional.) Put that down to the cost of getting the film made at all.

Story background -- The film takes place in the Archangelsk region. After raising her family, Tosia raised her daughter Vera's four children while she and her husband were off working on the trains on two-week shifts. The grandchildren are raised, Tosia has sold her house and given them the proceeds, and lives with Vera and her husband. For a tragic reason, she's sent off to her widowed younger sister's, in a village. The sister breaks a hip and her daughter Lysa, a successful TV journalist, tries to put Granny (Babusya) up with her cousins (Tosia's grandchildren). She essentially fails.

The object of the film, however, is not this story which, as others have noted, in one form or another is an ageless classic. Rather, it is the contrast between what may be called "old Russians", still centered on their village (mostly women and mostly old), and what the film calls "new Russians", the younger generation busy making it in the city, and which in ten or fifteen years has managed to perfectly learn to look out for numero uno. (Or perfectly unlearn humanity, as one "old Russian", Oleg (?), puts it to a new Russian.)

The hardest blows aimed at Granny occur in her absence, addressed to Lysa, who in a sense stands for the audience. Lysa explains to Oleg that "the new Russians are the masters of *that* world". Oleg answers, "Are you sure you're part of *this* world, then?"

The "old Russians'" daily life is carefully depicted. The film will interest those who are attracted by this depiction, and only then by the contrast with the "new Russian" class.