Moskva

The daily life of a Kirghiz family in Moscow: casual labour on worksites, paltry wages, pay-offs to jobmongers, the lack of money, difficult relations with neighbours… The entire family lives in an 8m² room. These 8m² are their whole world, a world they never leave and where the mother’s rule is indivisible. Only the youngest of her three children works. As a building-site mason, he provides the family’s sole income. Her daughter helps with the housework, but the husband, who has a hand-injury, is unemployed. Her eldest son cannot find work. He is not too keen anyway: the sexy girls on the ads, the games and walkmans of the Muscovite youth are a cruel reminder that he doesn’t belong to their world. Living in Moscow, without being there. The young man finds entertainment and comfort in the films that mirror his own plight: Fassbinder’s Der Katzelmacher, Visconti’s Rocco e i suoi fratelli… (Yann Lardeau)