FREEZE, DIE, COME TO LIFE

Filming in stark black and white, writer/director Vitali Kanevski presents an autobiographical portrait of life in a squalid Soviet gulag?cum?city in the far eastern region, where the quality of life for the political prisoners hardly differs from that of the local miners. The everyday insanity, the petty brutalities, the lack of food, material goods, and love, and the unending bleakness of it all add up to a hideously typical portrait of the Stalin years. But amid this sadness and despair, two small children manage to play, grow, fantasize, and generally thrive together, sustaining their optimism and offering a glimmer of hope for their nation. Kanevski won the Camera d'Or Award for the best first film at the 1990 Cannes Film Festival.