England! (2000)

Valery is ill, mortally ill. He was one of the many helpers after the nuclear disaster in Chernobyl. But he has a dream. See England, the ocean, together with his friend. But the friend live in Berlin. So he starts an odyssey. And so starts an wonderful movie.

`England!' lives from the fantastic and urgent play of his main actor, Ivan Shvedov. In every single moment of the movie, you are anxious and hope for the best. Every little feeling goes under the skin. That´s very rare in today's movie landscape. So you enjoy, as he drive toward the German border and make a young female acquaintance. You are afraid, as he swim through the river. You suffer, as he search Friends and companions on his voyage. You hope for an good end of life, as he finally comes to England. And you are astonished about the philosophic and successful end of the movie. A permanent up and down, from which you don't want to miss a second.

But this is not all. The `adventures' in the big city, almost like a road movie, open the eyes. They show us, how our society develop, in the treatment of foreigners and ourselves. You laugh and cry at the same time about the exhibitor who speak a lot and say not so much or about the labour office as a cathedral of modern times. A little bit of sadness. And this mood strengthens through the special kind of language. Like many foreigners, Valeri speaks in broken German. Normally it's droll to hear how yourself sounds in another language. But here it suits perfectly for the situation, the loneliness of the single human being on the search for the personal fortune. And it let forget the difficulties of the subtitles at the beginning, they are necessary, but disturbing.

An interesting story, good acting of a no-name-ensemble and involving characters, you need more ? You get ! Congenial music and sound accompany the tragicomic ballad about life and so, finally, a touch of melancholy appears.

If you have the possibility to see this movie, do it ! You won't regret it.