Brief Encounters

Kira Muratova's 1967 film moves between three people who are never in the same place at once. Nadya comes from the countryside to the city and takes work as a housekeeper, moving into her employer's flat. Valya works on the local party committee and spends her days on the water supply. What they share is Maksim, a geologist who has long been away on an expedition. Muratova plays Valya herself, and Vladimir Vysotsky plays Maksim. The scenes in which Vysotsky sings with a guitar give the film a separate historical value. The narrative is broken up by flashbacks, and who is remembering what, and when, is never explained. Soviet censors shelved the film, and it reached wide release only in the late eighties. What troubled them was not a political message but a tone: the dissatisfaction of the women and the refusal to present daily life as solvable. Who it's for: those curious about the strand of Soviet cinema outside the official narrative, and about Muratova. Who it's not for: viewers who want linear time and a clear plot; the film is deliberately scattered.