The Dream of a Ridiculous Man (1992)

Yet again, Petrov's attention to expressive detail is superb in this adaptation of Dostoevsky's story. We meet a man travelling on a train - well his body is, his mind is elsewhere. The dull, monotonic, narration tells us he is dwelling on the futility of his life and on thoughts of a bullet putting him out of his misery. Walking home he meets a young urchin who begs for help. He walks on by, ignoring her pleas, and goes to bed. It's in his dreams that we spend much of the next ten minutes and I found these to fairly biblical at times. Idyllic in nature to start then becoming more corrupt and vile, and his psyche amidst the dream seems to be trying to find where, if at all, his responsibility for this alternative world might lie. When he awakens, he must make a choice. Might it be better to live well in a flawed world - or to succumb to it's flaws and face something far, far worse. For some reason, the depiction of the man's face reminded me of Lenin throughout, the winkles and the earnestness in his eyes. The girl - well she could have been a poster girl for the French (or any other) revolution. A young child devoid of hope, or expectation, or love - and expertly captured here in her rags. The imagery is cold and bleak and it does largely accentuate the horrors of a world all about self. Astonishingly potent to watch.