Dovlatov charts six days in the life of a brilliant, ironic writer who saw far beyond the rigid limits of 70s Soviet Russia. Sergei Dovlatov fought to preserve his own talent and decency with poet and writer Joseph Brodsky, while watching his artist friends got crushed by the iron-willed state machinery.
Directed by Aleksei German Jr.
biography
IMDB
N/A
Letterboxd
3.3 / 5
Where to Watch
Cast
Milan Marić
Sergei Dovlatov
Danila Kozlovsky
David
Helena Sujecka
Elena Dovlatova
Eva Gerr
Katya Dovlatova
Arthur Beschastny
Iosif Brodskiy
Anton Shagin
Anton Kuznetsov
Svetlana Khodchenkova
Actress - Dovlatov's friend
Elena Lyadova
Young editor
Igor Mityushkin
Sholom Shvarts - artist
Piotr Gąsowski
Semyon Aleksandrovich
Tamara Oganesyan
Nora Dovlatova - Sergei Dovlatov mother
Anna Ekaterininskaya
Deputy director of the plant
Crew
Aleksei German Jr.
Director
Aleksei German Jr.
Screenplay
Łukasz Żal
Director of Photography
Dariusz Jabłoński
Producer
Eduard Pichugin
Co-Producer
Sergey Titinkov
Co-Producer
Olga Yuntunen
Executive Producer
Vladimir Golov
Casting Director
Sergey Dovlatov
In Memory Of
Konstantin Ernst
General Manager
Elena Dovlatova
Thanks
Artem Vasilyev
General Manager
Popular Reviews
9 reviews
Dani
7.0★ · 04/06/18
"There were rules in Soviet literature magazines: incompetence is unprofitable, talent is alarming, genius is terrifying. The most popular currency is moderate literary abilities."Shame on me but I've never read or even heard of Sergei Dovlatov but after this movie I definitely will read some of his works. This is the story about talented and aspired Soviet writer who because of his "inconvenient" thoughts almost got crushed by ignorance of communism and the governors for whom any thought that was differ from theirs was counted as wrong, immoral or even criminal, and his story is just one of the many. Only after his death he became popular and got feedback all over the world that he deserved, but sadly he'll never know it. And even now, in post-Soviet countires stories like that aren't very uncommon and still happen.
As for the movie itself is very slow and it's probably the biggest flaw of this movie. Anyways DOVLATOV is very beautiful and stylish movie, long one-takes, tracking shots, fog in the streets build this almost dreamlike effect which I really liked. Also it's a great movie about 70s with all parties for all poor writers, musicians etc. merchants who illegally sell banned foreign literature, parfume, alchohol. It's almost like HBO's Vinyl but in USSR instead and it's cool.
Overall I'm not sure what to think about this movie, on the one hand it's a beautiful and meditative movie but on the other hand it's boring as hell.
"There were rules in Soviet literature magazines: incompetence is unprofitable, talent is alarming, genius is terrifying. The most popular currency is moderate literary abilities."Shame on me but I've never read or even heard of Sergei Dovlatov but after this movie I definitely will read some of his works. This is the story about talented and aspired Soviet writer who because of his "inconvenient" thoughts almost got crushed by ignorance of communism and the governors for whom any thought that was differ from theirs was counted as wrong, immoral or even criminal, and his story is just one of the many. Only after his death he became popular and got feedback all over the world that he deserved, but sadly he'll never know it. And even now, in post-Soviet countires stories like that aren't very uncommon and still happen.
As for the movie itself is very slow and it's probably the biggest flaw of this movie. Anyways DOVLATOV is very beautiful and stylish movie, long one-takes, tracking shots, fog in the streets build this almost dreamlike effect which I really liked. Also it's a great movie about 70s with all parties for all poor writers, musicians etc. merchants who illegally sell banned foreign literature, parfume, alchohol. It's almost like HBO's Vinyl but in USSR instead and it's cool.
Overall I'm not sure what to think about this movie, on the one hand it's a beautiful and meditative movie but on the other hand it's boring as hell.
Dani
7.0★ · 04/06/18
"There were rules in Soviet literature magazines: incompetence is unprofitable, talent is alarming, genius is terrifying. The most popular currency is moderate literary abilities."Shame on me but I've never read or even heard of Sergei Dovlatov but after this movie I definitely will read some of his works. This is the story about talented and aspired Soviet writer who because of his "inconvenient" thoughts almost got crushed by ignorance of communism and the governors for whom any thought that was differ from theirs was counted as wrong, immoral or even criminal, and his story is just one of the many. Only after his death he became popular and got feedback all over the world that he deserved, but sadly he'll never know it. And even now, in post-Soviet countires stories like that aren't very uncommon and still happen.
As for the movie itself is very slow and it's probably the biggest flaw of this movie. Anyways DOVLATOV is very beautiful and stylish movie, long one-takes, tracking shots, fog in the streets build this almost dreamlike effect which I really liked. Also it's a great movie about 70s with all parties for all poor writers, musicians etc. merchants who illegally sell banned foreign literature, parfume, alchohol. It's almost like HBO's Vinyl but in USSR instead and it's cool.
Overall I'm not sure what to think about this movie, on the one hand it's a beautiful and meditative movie but on the other hand it's boring as hell.
"There were rules in Soviet literature magazines: incompetence is unprofitable, talent is alarming, genius is terrifying. The most popular currency is moderate literary abilities."Shame on me but I've never read or even heard of Sergei Dovlatov but after this movie I definitely will read some of his works. This is the story about talented and aspired Soviet writer who because of his "inconvenient" thoughts almost got crushed by ignorance of communism and the governors for whom any thought that was differ from theirs was counted as wrong, immoral or even criminal, and his story is just one of the many. Only after his death he became popular and got feedback all over the world that he deserved, but sadly he'll never know it. And even now, in post-Soviet countires stories like that aren't very uncommon and still happen.
As for the movie itself is very slow and it's probably the biggest flaw of this movie. Anyways DOVLATOV is very beautiful and stylish movie, long one-takes, tracking shots, fog in the streets build this almost dreamlike effect which I really liked. Also it's a great movie about 70s with all parties for all poor writers, musicians etc. merchants who illegally sell banned foreign literature, parfume, alchohol. It's almost like HBO's Vinyl but in USSR instead and it's cool.
Overall I'm not sure what to think about this movie, on the one hand it's a beautiful and meditative movie but on the other hand it's boring as hell.
