A Room and a Half Review
By David Kempler
"Room" for Improvement
Russian-Jewish-American poet, and Nobel Prize Laureate, Joseph Brodsky was expelled from the USSR in 1972. He often fantasized about returning to Mother Russia, specifically his home town of St. Petersburg, the cultural capital. Director and co-writer, Andrey Khrzhanovsky has set off an imagined what-if journey where Brodsky actually made the trek back. By combining fantasy, newsreels (both real and fake), and truly whimsical animation, he almost succeeds in his quest.
At the outset we observe an adult Brodsky (Grigoriy Dityatkovskiy) lounging on a passenger ship heading home to the place of his childhood. He appears to be the only occupant of the cruise and he spends his time in a deck chair, bundled-up against the elements, smoking, and drifting off into his childhood. Everything around him is gray and foggy, conjuring up "Ship of Fools", minus the other passengers. As he drifts off, we see his memories.
We watch three versions of Brodsky in these fantasy re-enactments, first as a very young boy, next as a rebellious twentyish young man, exposed to the new Western influences seeping into his country and looking to score with the ladies. Finally, we see him as the returned older man, lost in the fantasies and memories of his childhood, mixed with looking back at growing up with his parents, played by Sergei Yursky and Alissa Freyndlih. They are the anchors of "A Room and a Half". His father is a war veteran that is more of a playmate to Brodsky then father, but not in a bad way. Mother is the more serious of the two but she, too, is far from a stern, cold woman. His childhood, all things considered, is pretty good and fairly unremarkable. There is a genuine warmth that pervades their apartment. Despite all of his success in the Western world as an adult, that warmth has never been replaced.
Andrey Khrzhanovsky has chosen to weave fantasy and whimsy throughout and why it does not entirely work is unclear. Perhaps the sometimes slow pacing and lack of "large" events makes it feel like it meanders rather than holding our attention. The animation, with heavy attention paid to house cats, is cute and at times revealing but becomes more of a distraction than anything else.
There is one outstanding scene where musical instruments rise en masse all over the city and gently flow out of town, signifying the culture leaving along with the Jews who are being pushed aside in society. However, one great scene does not a great movie make. "A Room and a Half" is an artistic attempt to capture the melancholy below the surface of Brodsky's life. While I can say that it succeeded in that quest, I can also say that it failed to entertain enough. We are left with too many moments where we really don't care and when that happens, there is certainly room for improvement.
