Runtime: 132 minutes
Directed by: Georgiy Daneliya
Starring: Stanislav Lyubshin, Levan Gabriadze, Yury Yakovlev, Yevgeny Leonov, Nikolai Garo
From: Mosfilm
“A Soviet comedy” turned out better than you might expect. For years I’ve known of this sci-fi comedy film; as Arrow recently added it to their streaming service via Deaf Crocodile (I’d be happy if they added more releases from the Deaf Crocodile label) last night felt the time to finally give the movie a shot, despite the long length of over 2 hours.
I was worried how the comedy popular in a Communist country would translate to a modern capitalist heathen like myself. To “borrow” a phrase, this is “Mad Max meets Monty Python by way of Tarkovsky.” Apparently, fans of Kurt Vonnegut might also dig this. A middle-aged dude named Vladimir Mashkov (not the Russian actor who was in Behind Enemy Lines and Mission: Impossible-Ghost Protocol) and a young Georgian named Gedevan Alexidze randomly meet each other as they interact w/ an old guy claiming to be an alien. Hysterically, he says he stole clothing from a bum as if was Kyle Reese!
The alien has a teleportation device but doesn’t know how to give home. The two Soviets of course don’t believe him-Vladimir presses a button and suddenly both Vladimir and Gedevan are on the planet Pluke in the Kin-Dza-Dza galaxy. What follows is wacky absurd humor as they meet a pair of odd dudes and discover the planet’s language is one where most words are pronounced as “Groot”… er, I mean “Koo”, it’s a post-apocalyptic desert planet (most of this was filmed in Turkmenistan, i.e. a country that’s had a horrible human rights record since the fall of the Soviet Union but that’s not germane to the conversation) where matchsticks are currency and other oddities won’t be spoiled by me. I can say that the violin Gedevan has-which isn’t even his, but long story-was used as the power of music means the same across the universe.
Soviet/Russian cinema until last night was best-known to me for the Tarkovsky films & Come and See. There are other genres I’ve checked out but at least in the case of Dza, the wacky absurd comedy stylings did entertain me. Terry Gilliam is another comparison I heard, specifically Brazil. I now understand why this oddity is a cult film around the world and was (is?) still popular in Russia/the surrounding environs.
January and perhaps 2026 in general, I hope to have at least a bit more variety in what is viewed/reviewed. More documentaries, foreign films from the likes of Russia-including comedies-various oddities, etc. Thank goodness Kin-Dza-Dza! translated well to a 2025 capitalist pig like myself.
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