Khrustalyov, mashinu! (Khrustalyov, My Car!) (1998)

This is a film of spit and paranoia, a truly raw satire that looks even better than it did 20 years ago thanks to a loving, new restoration.

One of the great Russian films about how the Soviet Union works as a police state.

Aleksei German...gives us an almost incomprehensible freak show in order to let his audience experience first hand the insane asylum he equates with life in Stalinist Russia.

In "Khrustalyov, My Car!" General Klensky(Yuriy Tsurilo) is the head of a mental hospital in the former Soviet Union. The insanity that he witnesses there carries over to his family life which is depicted in the same madcap and whirligig way. What can be inferred is that this is set during the Stalinist reign of terror, replete with random people being disappeared right, left and center while it would take more information to identify everybody in Klensky's home to any satisfaction. There is also a key turning point in history that the movie treats in as matter of fact way as humanly possible. Which is the way history usually happens in real time. Except I'm sure the participants would have some feeling as to what was about to change, no matter what the movie may think. At least, it chooses the perfect moment to end on.