LILYA 4-EVER
Directed by: Lukas Moodysson.
Produced by: Lars Jönsson.
Written by: Moodysson.
Director of Photography: Ulf Brantås.
Edited by: Michal Leszcylowski, Oleg Morgunov & Bernhard Winkler.
Music by: Nathan Larson.
Released by: Newmarket.
Country of Origin: Sweden. 109 min. Rated: R.
With: Oksana Akinshina & Artyom Bogucharsky.

From the opening sequence where a pretty 16-year-old girl with a bruised face stares down on a highway from an overpass, the audience will have a strong sense of how this film will end. The rest of Lilya is one long flashback which plots this illegal Russian immigrant’s disintegration in Sweden and is just as predictable in this overlong drama which, unlike the director’s last film, Together, offers no surprises. A typical teenager, Lilya (Akinshina) is proud to be born on the same day as Britney Spears, covets brand names, and rebels against authority. She is abandoned by her family, struggles to survive on her own in a Russian slum only to be betrayed by her best girl friend and unjustly accused of being a whore. The title refers to the graffiti she carves in a bench while being taunted by a gang of boys. Her only friend is Volodya (Bogucharsky), two years younger, who escapes to Lilya’s hovel from his alcoholic father’s beatings. Drug abuse and degradation are sure to follow. The hand-held camera work and the harsh lighting sets a harsh tone that is undermined by the corny coda, a change in tone similar to The Man on the Train. And because Lilya and Volodya’s fates are predetermined, they remain unconvincing. KT
May 30, 2003