David O'ConnellSwedish masterpiece: Lilya 4-ever (2002)
May 27th 2008 08:10
The most recent great hope of Swedish cinema, director Lukas Moodysson, first attracted international recognition with Show Me Love in 1998 (which even the great master Ingmar Bergman heaped praise upon), quickly followed by hippie-commune drama, Together, in 2000. But his greatest impact on world cinema was still to come in the form of his confronting and shocking insight into the world of child prostitution in 2002’s Lilya 4-ever.
With this film, Lukas Moodysson had truly arrived on a world stage, and this is one film you simply cannot walk away from unaffected by.
It’s the story of 16 year old Lilya (Oksana Akinshina), living in relative poverty amidst bleak grey tenement skylines somewhere in the old USSR, who is left to fend for herself when her mother decides to leave for America without her on a whim to be with her new boyfriend who she’s met through a dating agency.
Her only friend in the world is a young boy, Volodya (Artyom Bogucharsky), who is a source of ridicule amongst the local kids. Her callous aunt has virtually kicked her out of her own home and into a tiny grotty apartment where the previous tenant, an old man, recently died. She is soon left to her own defenses in a harsh and poverty-stricken world, turning to prostitution to survive.
Earlier we see her maintaining her faith, praying at night before a framed photo of angels which will become symbolic later in the film.
A ray of hope emerges from her bleak existence in the form of Andrei (Pavel Ponomaryov), a good looking young man who takes a shine to Lilya and they begin seeing one another. You get the impression that Lilya has been so harshly treated by the world to this point in her short young life that she willingly and naively clings to the hope that Andrei will be the embodiment of the yearning she and Volodya express for happier days in the future.
Her gullibility is soon to become her most fatal flaw however as she is lured by Andrei into taking a trip to Sweden for a job where, instead, she becomes an illegal immigrant and the true horror of life will be confronted, held against her own will and used like a piece of meat for the profit of exploitative, amoral suitors.
The dread of Lilya’s incarceration is palpable and Moodysson’s gritty approach invokes terrifying insights into this girl’s horrible plight. Her despair and sense of abandonment at the hands of her mother will only strengthen and intensify over this time as well, leaving her in bitter despair.
The film’s heart-breaking final scenes become, through an element of fantasy and wish-fulfillment, a literal transformation of Lilya’s earlier display of faith and the ties of friendship with Volodya she abandoned in her homeland, imagining an alternate path never taken, the dreamy sense of painful regret matched by Nathan Larson’s haunting, ethereal score.
At times graphic and raw, Moodysson’s bleak denouement feels somewhat redemptive and necessary though he does abandon the almost documentary-like naturalism of much of the film which some viewers may feel is an easy way out.
This is an important work of world cinema however, even though, admittedly, it may be a film you come away from admiring more than enjoying.
With this film, Lukas Moodysson had truly arrived on a world stage, and this is one film you simply cannot walk away from unaffected by.
It’s the story of 16 year old Lilya (Oksana Akinshina), living in relative poverty amidst bleak grey tenement skylines somewhere in the old USSR, who is left to fend for herself when her mother decides to leave for America without her on a whim to be with her new boyfriend who she’s met through a dating agency.
Her only friend in the world is a young boy, Volodya (Artyom Bogucharsky), who is a source of ridicule amongst the local kids. Her callous aunt has virtually kicked her out of her own home and into a tiny grotty apartment where the previous tenant, an old man, recently died. She is soon left to her own defenses in a harsh and poverty-stricken world, turning to prostitution to survive.
Earlier we see her maintaining her faith, praying at night before a framed photo of angels which will become symbolic later in the film.
A ray of hope emerges from her bleak existence in the form of Andrei (Pavel Ponomaryov), a good looking young man who takes a shine to Lilya and they begin seeing one another. You get the impression that Lilya has been so harshly treated by the world to this point in her short young life that she willingly and naively clings to the hope that Andrei will be the embodiment of the yearning she and Volodya express for happier days in the future.
Her gullibility is soon to become her most fatal flaw however as she is lured by Andrei into taking a trip to Sweden for a job where, instead, she becomes an illegal immigrant and the true horror of life will be confronted, held against her own will and used like a piece of meat for the profit of exploitative, amoral suitors.
The dread of Lilya’s incarceration is palpable and Moodysson’s gritty approach invokes terrifying insights into this girl’s horrible plight. Her despair and sense of abandonment at the hands of her mother will only strengthen and intensify over this time as well, leaving her in bitter despair.
The film’s heart-breaking final scenes become, through an element of fantasy and wish-fulfillment, a literal transformation of Lilya’s earlier display of faith and the ties of friendship with Volodya she abandoned in her homeland, imagining an alternate path never taken, the dreamy sense of painful regret matched by Nathan Larson’s haunting, ethereal score.
At times graphic and raw, Moodysson’s bleak denouement feels somewhat redemptive and necessary though he does abandon the almost documentary-like naturalism of much of the film which some viewers may feel is an easy way out.
This is an important work of world cinema however, even though, admittedly, it may be a film you come away from admiring more than enjoying.
Volodya and Lilya
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Comment by Anonymous
I like this cacophony of eclecticism, your tastes are quite varied.
Out of interest I was wondering what genre interests you most?........ I apologize if I'm off topic but as I'm typing I'm being distracted by the semi naked pic of Tom Selik.......the mustache has an hypnotic affect.........
Comment by Bryn
Horrorphile
Excellent review.
I've seen Fucking Amal (aka Show Me Love), but not Together.
I would like to see the film he made a couple of years ago called A Hole in My Heart, but it is not available in Australia on DVD and never recieved a theatrical release.
Comment by David O'Connell
Screen Fanatic