The Fountain

Mamin's film is already a historical record of a certain phase of perestroika. But as an extremely broad social comedy, as well as a swingeing critique of personal and bureaucratic (ir)responsibility, it's little short of irresistible. Kazakhstan herdsman Kerbabaev moves to Moscow to live with his daughter and her husband Peter, the harassed maintenance official of a rancid, crumbling apartment block beset by constant disasters. With its catalogue of accumulating mishaps, The Fountain fires off its barbs in ample salvos, some of them perhaps too obviously allegorical of Russia's woes. But as an adeptly choreographed ensemble piece, and for its fairly pullulating sense of place, the film gushes with anarchic pleasures.