Anna Mikhalkova Movies

Freed from her loveless marriage by the death of her brutal and much-older spouse, a thirty-five year old woman who was married directly out of the orphanage embarks on a unique journey of self discovery in this drama from director Vera Storozheva. Natalya was just sixteen when a narrow-minded tyrant from the countryside arrived at the orphanage and claimed her as his wife, and for the next nineteen years she lived a suffocating life of quiet desperation. Now freed from the habit and prejudice that once dictated her every move, Natalya ventures cautiously into the outside world. Upon making the acquaintance of a kind and handsome trucker named Sergey, the woman who once had no future finally has reason to hope. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Forbidden love brings both happiness and tension to two people in this domestic drama. Ilya (Mikhail Porechenkov) and Nina (Anna Mikhalkova) are two people edging into middle age who have made successful careers for themselves in "the New Russia" -- Ilya runs a profitable business in Moscow, while Nina edits a magazine based in St. Petersburg. Ilya and Nina are also married, but not to each other -- while they've been having an affair for several years, Ilya isn't willing to leave his wife Masha (Nastya Seglia), while Nina doesn't want to break things off with her husband Nikita (Dmitry Shevchenko). Instead, Ilya and Nina meet as often as possible on the neutral ground of an inexpensive hotel, and while they clearly enjoy their sexual relationship, they also seem to find an emotional succor in one another they don't get from their spouses. The couple takes great pains to keep their romance a secret from their partners, but with the passage of time the emotion drain of living double lives takes a toll on Ilya and Nina, as well as their mates. Svyaz (aka Relations) was the first feature for director and screenwriter Avdotia Smirnova. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Love blooms amidst the backdrop of czarist Russia in Nikita Mikhalkov's The Barber of Siberia. The story opens in 1905 Springfield, MA, when a woman writes a letter to a young man in a military summer-training camp. He is currently being punished by one of his superiors, who forces him to wear a gas mask until he acknowledges that Mozart was a worthless composer. The woman has an important story to tell her addressee, and our story flashes back 20 years to Russia, where American Jane Callahan (Julia Ormond) is traveling to Moscow. A man who may or may not be Jane's father, Douglas McCracken (Richard Harris), is trying to perfect a machine, christened "The Barber of Siberia," that will harvest trees from the vast Siberian forests. Douglas hopes Jane can charm Gen. Radlov (Alexei Petrenko), the head of a Russian military academy, into arranging the financing that will enable him to complete his work on the harvester. En route, Jane meets a friendly Russian soldier, Andrei Tolstoy (Oleg Menshikov), and the two soon fall in love. Jane then meets and flirts with Radlov, who grows reciprocally fond of her -- enough so that he asks her to marry him. When it becomes evident she'd rather be with Tolstoy, he finds himself shipped off to Siberia after allegedly attacking a grand duke. Merging romance, costume drama, and slapstick comedy, The Barber of Siberia was screened at the 1999 Cannes Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Home movies with a political edge are the focus of this documentary that chronicles the childhood of director Nikita Mikhailkov's daughter Anna. He began this film in 1980 when his daughter was only 6-years old. At that time it was illegal to make home movies in Russia so he and his friends were very careful. Each year he would film her and ask her the following questions: What do you want the most? What do you fear? What do you hate? Her answers each year reflect her changes from innocent child to Soviet citizen. Her changes correspond well with the recent changes in Russia. Included in the film are also archival newsclips that complement her story. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide