When an old friend shows up at a family in Russia in 1936, at the very beginning of the great terror of the people by the Communist regime, it costs them their happiness. Eventually. Really, almost all of this is just steeped in that glee. A solid hour of this passes with nothing at all happening. And not much does take place after that. I have no problem with character development, but this has far too many roles for us to remember even half of them, and it doesn't seem like it's important, other than to emphasize that they are, well, all there, and all in a good mood. And this has a lot of "noise", with singing, cheering and in general, you can hear something much of the time. This is filmed well, and the acting tends to be convincing. It shows what it was like back then, if it is a tad, well, covered in a sugary glaze considering what it's about. Charm? Sure. This does have occasional compelling imagery, as well. I suppose that this is like other movies from France, but I know that they can look straight in the eye of something negative, also, and I think it would have fit better to do so here, as well. There is sexuality, language and bloody, disturbing violence(mostly not shown) in this. I recommend this to, well, fans of this kind of thing. 7/10
Review of Burnt by the Sun
