This is the strangest, trippiest, most bizarrely wierd movie I've seen in a long time. In this case, that's not necessarily a compliment, though I can't say I regret seeing it either. That is some seriously messed up cinema.

First off, I have to congratulate the director and all involved for performing a rare (though not entirely unprecedented) feat. One massively long, winding, continuous shot comprises the entire 90 minute movie. Technically, this is no small feat to pull off. I can imagine it being a logistical nightmare to rig it all so that everything works on cue, actors are all in their places at the right times, and everything goes as it should. But they did it.

But narratively? My God, WTF was going on?

I say that as a fan of surrealist abstract film-making. But this one was just way over the line in terms of the kooky nut factor.

The story consists of.... Wait, there isn't really a story. (Or at least none that I could detect.) Scratch that.

The film consists of... a first-person perspective shot of the main "character" wandering around a very extravagant historical museum in St Petersburg. (He is never seen, because the camera view is through his eyes; but he talks every now and then, making obscure random comments about things, and having discussions with his semi-imaginary friend -- a goofy old man who does appear onscreen quite frequently.)

BTW, did I mention that the whole thing is in Russian with subtitles? That's par for the course, given that it's a Russian film. But I found it especially amusing, because for some inexplicable reason, during the early minutes of the film, the main guy and his "friend" have a protracted discussion about the fact that they are speaking in Russion; one of them seems fairly surprised and taken aback by it. ("I'm speaking Russian? I guess I am, aren't I?") Why? That is the least of this film's mysteries.

As the main character wanders around the museum, he sees various people in period costumes re-enacting a mish-mash of historical events that span the centuries. (Or so the theory goes.)

There's a lot of other random stuff thrown in too. The most hilarious is the old man who accompanies our character. He makes all sorts of wacky pronouncements about Russian czars, royalty, and whatnot. He gets all flustered about some of the paintings on the wall, and complains bitterly to a couple of modern-looking tourists about the arrangement of the paintings, juxtapositioned next to each other in a way that doesn't make sense. (Though he was most goofy in his mannerisms, I have to concede that he had a good point in this case. Putting a circumcized Jesus next to a Cleopatra painting in the same gallery is really kind of ridiculous.)

It gets worse. Our opinionated elderly friend, who the main character sometimes refers to as "Europe" (Old Europe?), turns up the insanity a few notches when he starts trying to flirt with a middle-aged woman who happens to be looking at the paintings in the art gallery. He leans over her shoulder, follows her around, all the while making his routinely off-the-wall comments in what might be construed as a futile attempt to seduce this equally strange woman. It doesn't work. Eventually, the museum staff come and forcefully eject him from that section of the building.

On another occassion, he lectures a young boy who's looking at one of the paintings about "Reading the Scriptures." Honestly, this guy reminded me of some of the more colorful old people who would regularly visit the grocery store when I worked there.

There's a lot of scenes portraying Russian royalty of centuries past doing their thing. If I had more than a vaguely sketchy knowledge of Russian history, I'd probably appreciate these bits more. As it was, there was utterly zero in the way of background explanation or context for any of it (other than the nuttily cryptic statements made by the 2 main characters). Just passing glimpses of this and that. No discernable rhyme or reason.

The final 20 minutes or so consisted of an almost dialog-free meandering around in circles through a ball where a bunch of people danced around while an orchestra played. At this point, it became a snooze fest extraordinaire, but I guess that's all part of the art. (Get on with the lack of story, for crying out loud!)

As if the endless ball itself weren't enough to bore everyone to death, our main character then proceeds to walk out amidst the massive crowd. For at least 5 minutes, the camera dwindles, as the character makes his way out with all the people. Imagine you're in a very crowded building trying to get out after a concert or something. Clip a camera to your forehead, as other people's backs are in front of you, and you just have to stand and wait for enough people to move before you can take another step. That's the last 5 minutes of this movie. Lovely.

(On the plus side, the architecture surrounding the crowd was cool. But still.... why?)

Then, the final closing bit of the shot which was the movie.... Inexplicable.

Actually, that is the word I describe this entire piece: Inexplicable. A technical wonder, but emotionally, it did utterly nothing for me, except for a few chuckles about what a goofball that old guy was making of himself. It was not informative; though other sources assure many of the scenes were portrayed with an accurate eye for history, that history was not explained or covered with any depth whatsoever. It was all just sort of thrown around in this oddly bunched-up mess.

But it was trippy, I have to give it that. The custumes were very good. The building in which it was filmed was a wonder of the world.

So there it is. This concludes another edition of Bitscape's Wierder than Wierd Cinema.