Hipsters
Fri. 07/06 | 6:00PM @ Gene Siskel Film Center (map)
- Event Details
- (STILYAGI) 2008, Valery Todorovsky, Russia, 125 min. With Anton Shagin, Oksana Akinshina “Irrepressibly upbeat...an ecstatically candy-colored romp.” —Ella Taylor, NPR “Kind of amazing...the whole two hours feels like a fever dream.” —Mark Feeney, The Boston Globe ABSOLUTE BEGINNERS, HAIRSPRAY, and SWING KIDS are all possible reference points for HIPSTERS, but this Russian dudes-vs.-prudes musical has enough delirious energy and emotional punch to carry its own tune. The story centers on the rock ‘n’ roll subculture that bloomed briefly in the USSR during the post-Stalinist thaw of the mid-1950s. Mels (Shagin), a proper young party-liner, has his ideology undermined when he encounters the hipsters who hang out at Moscow’s Pompadour Club. Enchanted by the coolest of kitties Polly (the radiant Akinshina of LILYA 4-EVER), Mels is soon up to his sideburns in doo-wop and ducktails, but this is still Russia, and a hard-line crackdown is always just around the corner. The splashy musical numbers are infectious, the costumes and hair-dos are humungous, and the weirdos-of-the-world-unite climax is genuinely moving. In Russian with English subtitles. 35mm widescreen. (MR)
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