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4 (2006)

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All Critics
Top Critics

Average Rating: 6.8/10
Reviews Counted: 16
Fresh: 13 | Rotten: 3

No consensus yet.

Average Rating: 6.7/10
Critic Reviews: 7
Fresh: 5 | Rotten: 2

No consensus yet.

audience

liked it
Average Rating: 3/5
User Ratings: 41

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Movie Info

An unexpected encounter between three strangers in a Moscow bar prompts outlandish tales of their prominent careers -- far removed from the mundane day-to-day routine. Once they depart the late-night session of spinning stories, each of them return to their harsh realities in a dark and industrial Russian landscape. Ilya Khrzhanovsky's controversial film explores existential ideas about repetition with a surreal and disturbing cinematic eye.

Unrated, 2 hr. 6 min.

Art House & International, Drama

Directed By: Ilya Khrjanovsky

In Theaters: Apr 7, 2006 Wide

On DVD: Oct 3, 2006

Leisure Time

4 Trailer & Photos

More Photos (3)

Cast

Critic Reviews for 4

All Critics (21) | Top Critics (8) | Fresh (13) | Rotten (3)

The result is a teasing, if trying, exercise.

September 15, 2006 Full Review Source: Chicago Sun-Times

| Comment

Bill Stamets

Chicago Sun-Times

Top Critic

This seriously weird pic has a few flat stretches, but its bawdy comedy, bravura sound design and uncanny atmosphere will turn on auds with a taste for deeply oddball fare and baffle others.

August 4, 2006 Full Review Source: Variety

| Comment

Leslie Felperin

Variety

Top Critic

There's much in the movie that won't translate to audiences this side of the Volga, but there's also a humor and a fierce filmmaking intelligence that demand attention.

August 4, 2006 Full Review Source: Boston Globe

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Ty Burr

Boston Globe

Top Critic

The picture finally bogs down in a seemingly endless spectacle of grossness and ghoulishness.

May 10, 2006 Full Review Source: New York Observer

| Comment

Andrew Sarris

New York Observer

Top Critic

It's not always clear exactly what's happening in this dark tale, full of barking dogs and slabs of meat. But you won't be able to take your eyes from the screen; nor will you quickly forget this fiercely original eye-popper.

April 7, 2006 Comment

V.A. Musetto

New York Post

Top Critic

The terminally bleak meets the hypnotically beautiful in the Russian cryptogram 4, directed by the newcomer Ilya Khrzhanovsky.

April 6, 2006 Full Review Source: New York Times

| Comment

Manohla Dargis

New York Times

Top Critic

The performances are so good and the images so darkly expressive that Khrzhanovsky's experiment with cinematic deconstructionism nearly works.

March 1, 2007 Full Review Source: Film Journal International

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Maria Garcia

Film Journal International

a malcontent mindbender

December 20, 2006 Full Review Source: Filmcritic.com

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Chris Cabin

Filmcritic.com

A creepy, Lynchian dream-walk into the purgatory of human mass production

June 13, 2006 Comment

Ron Wilkinson

Monsters and Critics

4 could be a gross-out phantasmagoria to test your cinematic stamina, or it could be a political commentary, though Khrjanovsky insists not.

May 26, 2006 Full Review Source: Combustible Celluloid

| Comment

Jeffrey M. Anderson

Combustible Celluloid

In spite of a handful of striking images%u2014a shot of dogs being scared off by pile-drivers, a spooky aquarium-cleaning, a drunken party in which withered old ladies lift their shirts and slap each others' breasts%u20144 never resolves into anything spe

April 6, 2006 Full Review Source: AV Club

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Noel Murray

AV Club

...suggestively arresting in strange ways that will attract cinephiles and fuel unanswerable discussion.

April 5, 2006 Full Review Source: ReelTalk Movie Reviews

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Donald J. Levit

ReelTalk Movie Reviews

Exhilarating, infuriating, mesmerizing, baffling, and out-and-out crazy, 4 certainly doesn't lack for ambition and outrageousness.

April 4, 2006 Full Review Source: Slant Magazine

| Comment

Nick Schager

Slant Magazine

More Critic Reviews

Audience Reviews for 4

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Three Moscow strangers meet at a bar, then we follow what happens to each of them after they leave (in theory, as the story of the prostitute returning to her drunken country village for a funeral takes up far more time than the others). Well shot, well acted, excellent sound design, but this one really shows off the

October 14, 2010

Greg S

Super Reviewer

"4" takes place in Moscow where a meat seller, Oleg(Yuri Laguta), a prostitute, Marina(Marina Vouchenko), and a piano-tuner, Vladmir(Sergey Shnurov), all walk into a bar around 3 am. They all lie about their varied professions - Oleg claims to supply drinking water to the government; Marina claims to be in charge of

April 16, 2006