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Aleksandra
A reverie of militarism, family turmoil, and weird eroticism
By
PETER KEOUGH
|
June 17, 2008
ALEKSANDRA
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3.0
Stars
ALEKSANDRA: Human drama from Aleksandr Sokurov.
One advantage to having a war zone right next door is that your grandmother can drop by for a visit. Set ostensibly in battle-weary Chechnya, Aleksandr Sokurov’s new reverie takes up the themes of militarism, family turmoil, and weird eroticism he explored in such previous films as
Father and Son
. The old woman of the title, stout and sturdy as a fireplug, takes an “armored train” to the outpost where her grandson is an officer. The soldiers in the camp treat her with bemused awe and annoyance — she’s a reminder of normality and home, but she also won’t stay put, wandering about the camp, chatting with sentries, straying into minefields, venturing beyond the gates to a local market. There she bonds more readily with the old Chechen women selling cigarettes than with her estranged flesh-and-blood and his mysterious missions to do she knows not what. Less visually exultant than Sokurov’s best, but in its human drama adding grit to his mythmaking.
Russian + Chechen | 92 minutes | Kendall Square
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