House of Fools
Studio: Paramount Classics
Release Date: 2003-08-29
Cast: Julia Vysotsky, Sultan Islamov, A. Kalyagin, Bryan Adams, Stanislav Varkki
Director: Andrei Konchalovsky
Screenwriter: Andrei Konchalovsky
Music Score: Edward Atemiev
WorkNameSort: House of Fools
Our Rating: 3.00
Reality-based drama of the absurd brings the first Chechen War to a Russian mental hospital, setting the inmates loose to cavort with the combatants and prodding us to make the inevitable associations. (War is crazy, see?) The highlight is Yuliya Vysotskaya’s performance as Janna, a lisping, lovestruck, accordion-playing psychotic who believes that she’s the fiancee of rocker Bryan Adams. (The pockmarked one himself appears as the object of her fantasies.) Otherwise, the brassy tuba blasts on the soundtrack accurately reflect the movie’s use of the afflicted as one-dimensional props; there’s even a midget, for no other apparent reason than that it worked for Fellini. Still, it’s hard to dislike a movie that identifies Russian mental patients as Bryan Adams’ core audience.
This article appears in Aug 27 – Sep 2, 2003.