***/****
starring Lala Sarkissian, Romen Avinian, Ivan Franek, Armen Marouthian
screenplay by Hiner Saleem, Lei Dinety, Pauline Gouzenne
directed by Hiner Saleem
by Bill Chambers Discombobulating and deadly dull for its initial half-hour, Hiner Saleem's Vodka Lemon coalesces before it's too late into something by no means ineffectual. The first in an accumulation of vignettes finds an old man being schlepped in his bed through the Armenian tundra to a funeral site, where he promptly removes his dentures to pipe a dirge for the other mourners. The picture continues to lightly tread such surreal ground until the whimsical closing shot, in which music also acts as a kind of catharsis; Saleem stocks as much of his faith in minimalism as he does absurdity, though, the hush merger proposing at the best of times–during the nonverbal love story between two transient peddlers that commandeers the narrative, for instance–Sunrise for a new era. With a title like Vodka Lemon and wintry bleakness as far as the eye can see, one could easily misinterpret this as a Mosfilm production, but the film, despite the economic hardships it itemizes, is more Beckett than Chekov, the title referring to the beverage served at a lemonade stand in the middle of nowhere, the characters carrying portable chairs with them on their regular snowbound treks not, it would seem, for the small luxury of idleness, but rather should an impromptu bottomless debate arise. Vodka Lemon is a self-confident work that disarms existential misery with humour without trivializing a soul–there's actually an abundance of joy to savour here, even if it takes a microscope. *** (out of four) | Programme: Contemporary World Cinema
