Gloss (2007) Poster

(2007)

User Reviews

Review this title
4 Reviews
Sort by:
Filter by Rating:
7/10
Pretty scary realistic film
andreygrachev14 March 2009
Well,I saw this film because Edward Artemiev made score for it. It is the story of underworld live of Moscow-based glamour model studio, that turns out to be a prostitution market. A girl from Rostov on Don comes to Moscow to become a model, but she does not fit the standards of that business. She is old enough and one of her legs is shorter. But she still has that idea that she must be that kind of star. But her ex-boyfriend a bandit from Rostov, who still loves her, made everything to help her. She becomes a body on a modern magazine cover, but..

Quite cynic and bloody ending. Anyway ,this look is close to reality. pretty critical Andrey Konchalovski's effort. You can see a lot of famous people acting very untypically . The real hymn of crazy money-makers.
9 out of 14 found this helpful. Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink
10/10
Outstanding Konchalovskiy drama.
Mozjoukine7 September 2010
The fact that this film has not drawn more attention makes you wonder who is going to the movies and who is writing about them today. I caught it unannounced on the ethic channel, which was heavy trailering LUST CAUTION at the time.

Konchalovskiy has always been a festival film front-runner and his SIBERIADE is one of the best films made by the Soviets. He's someone whose views on his society have not been forefronted in his films to date, which is good new / bad news. GLOSS breaks with that tradition.

This one gets stuck into Russia in the time of the oligarchs, mail order brides and the free market. Konchalovskiy doesn't like this any more than his brother liked Stalin in BURNED BY THE SUN. The film strives for significance, with the character commenting "It isn't perestroika now. It's globalization." The resemblance to the Julie Christie film DARLING, along with the use of old western pop music gives things an anachronistic, old fashioned quality, which may be the intention. The fashion designer is told his work is out of date in an era where they make sculptures out of urine in London - which is itself out of date.

The leading lady from the director's DOM DARAKOV is back, getting one of the great female roles, going from sweatshop vamp to leader of Russian society and getting more makeovers than the Universal Pictures trade mark. She registers as gorgeous and startlingly transformed. It is a strength of the film that we are not sure whether hers is a success story or not.

Film making is imposing, even with dodgy attempts at high style - the flash dissolves in the scene of beating the "Zionist" journo. They still have trouble getting a full spectrum out of their lab work, though the end credits assure us they are using Eastmancolor. Added to which there is an abundance of topless - and bottomless - female flesh of a high order on display.

Whether or not the film's attempts at shock impact are naive or nicely judged it is one of the most memorable items circulating and leaves the Almodovar- Girl With the Dragon Tattoo twaddle that fills up the specialized theatres in it's dust.
6 out of 9 found this helpful. Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink
10/10
Brilliant!!!
slash_8220 December 2007
I haven't expected to see such a wonderful movie before I've pushed play. This is one of the last years Russian's best. I belief everybody must see it. The director made his job excellent. The actors are ideal. The story is filled of absolutely right cinematographic moves. And finally perfectly-made mystery. I've heard so many bad reviews on this movie that I really was prepared to something weak. But probably this one is really that special that seems amazing for the ones and 'nothing really special' for others. And what can I say? Tose others are definitely did not understand this movie. They didn't understand anything, especially ideal directing. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to "Glyanets"!!!
11 out of 22 found this helpful. Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink
9/10
Shaping your own Destiny or Demise
piverba7 July 2022
Warning: Spoilers
Andrey Konchalovskiy is a Russian treasure, very creative director with long and fruitful career. Much was given to him by birth and much he had earned as a film director on his own. In my estimation, this film, as all his films, is a cinematic event. As any work of art, one must feel fabula carefully constructed (montaged) by the director. You classic training: Sergey Eisenstein, Italian neo-realism, etc.

Konchalovskiy was a part of the world cinema scene since sixties, he's deservedly internationally recognized figure. He makes, if not completely commercial, still film close to average audience, without formalisms making his films accessible only to connoisseurs. Yet, you can feel depth of the metaphors, compelling images, carefully constructed mise-en-scene, creative casting and dialog.

You must be living in USSR in the 80s and 90s to be able to appreciate some of the dialog and happening in Galya's flash backs to her childhood. But there is also a universal appreciation of child's hopes who's trying to please her mother - just to be slapped on the face. Child's tears and pain that compel her become something more than what she is destined to be. This energy feeding desire to stand-up which drives her, at the background of her mother and father, beyond redemption and hope. Her success at the end appears to be untrue, unjustified, impossible, especially in the view of a last scene of supposed her shooting by her former boyfriend, which connects her with the past, which just wouldn't let her go.

This failure/fulfilment paradox is a cautionary tail and ambiguity of wish-fulfilment, ill defined and not supported but only desire of motherhood and social standing. As if Konchalovskiy modeled a life situation which he couldn't understand/resolve himself and leave this mystery to ponder by the viewers.
0 out of 0 found this helpful. Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink

See also

Awards | FAQ | User Ratings | External Reviews | Metacritic Reviews


Recently Viewed