Moscow on the Hudson 1984: Movie and film review from Answers.com

Director: Paul Mazursky
AMG Rating:
Genre: Comedy Drama
Movie Type: Comedy of Manners
Themes: Immigrant Life, Living In Exile, Fish Out of Water
Main Cast: Robin Williams, Maria Conchita Alonso, Cleavant Derricks, Alejandro Rey, Savely Kramarov
Release Year: 1984
Country: US
Run Time: 115 minutes
MPAA Rating: R

Plot

Robin Williams stars as Vladimir Ivanoff, a Russian sax player working in a circus whose home life with his warm and colorful family does not compensate for his feelings of repression and lost opportunity in his native land. When the circus comes to New York, Williams goes on a shopping trip to Bloomingdale's -- where he suddenly announces his intention to defect. Befriended and given a place to stay by security guard Lionel Witherspoon (Cleavant Derricks), Vladimir makes the slow and sometimes painful transition from Russian to American citizen, helped along by his lady love (and fellow immigrant), Lucia Lombardo (Maria Conchita Alonso), and immigration attorney (and onetime Cuban refugee) Orlando Ramirez (Fernando Rey). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Review

Paul Mazursky's tale of a Russian saxophone player, Vladimir Ivanoff (Robin Williams), who defects in Bloomingdale's during a New York tour remains one of the director's most accomplished and deeply affecting works. As longtime fan Pauline Kael once observed, Mazursky is most inspired at his absolute messiest -- when he casually strings observational scenes together, bound by a cohesive overtone. Moscow on the Hudson embodied a huge stride forward for the director; Mazursky and co-screenwriter Leon Capetanos are able to maintain two narrative levels at once. On its surface, the story retains the haphazard, random, and slightly chaotic feel of everyday life in the States (like Mazursky's earlier pictures), but beneath it all, Mazursky and Capetanos meticulously structure the script, never once abandoning the path of watching Vlad become fully Americanized and relinquish his cultural identity. This idea of bittersweet assimilation not only sustains the picture, but creates its wholly original mood of sad-eyed seriocomedy; we laugh and nod in recognition, even as tears fill our eyes. Mazursky and Capetanos resist the urge to overtly politicize; they suggest that the socioeconomic drawbacks of living on the far side of the Curtain (such as the thousand-person lineups for toilet paper, poorly sized shoes, etc.) may have threatened to make life miserable, but that the existence of family and friends -- and a Russian cultural identity -- partially redeemed it all, which explains why Vlad so misses his homeland even as he relishes political asylum. Most clever are the related parallels that Mazursky and Capetanos establish between Vlad's kinfolk and the African-American clan of Lionel (Cleavant Derricks), with whom he comes to reside (such as the similarities of their eccentric grandfathers) -- reminding us that family is family, regardless of cultural or political backdrop.

The supporting cast -- made up almost entirely of ethnic performers, such as Maria Conchita Alonso as Vlad's Cuban lover, Lucia; and the late Flying Nun vet Alejandro Rey as Argentinean immigration attorney Orlando Ramirez -- is uniformly superb. Most impressive, however, is Williams, who climbs so deeply into character that he loses all traces of himself. That he failed to earn an Oscar nomination for this picture is outrageous. In interviews, he has vaguely referenced Mazursky's hyper-disciplined directorial style -- and one senses that this director, like George Roy Hill on the Garp set -- refused to let Williams cut up his scenes with shtick. Thank God for that; the actor's performance suggests that his ability as a thespian, when it is properly disciplined and grounded in a worthy production, far outstrips that of his Hollywood contemporaries. Mazursky and Capetanos fill their script with hilarious, touching, insightful moments, many used to capture the confusion and insanity that an Eastern European would experience upon immigrating to the Big Apple. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide

Cast

Robin Williams - Vladimir Ivanoff
Maria Conchita Alonso - Lucia Lombardo
Cleavant Derricks - Lionel Witherspoon
Alejandro Rey - Orlando Ramirez
Savely Kramarov - Boris

Elya Baskin - Anatoly; Oleg Rudnick - Yuri; Natalie Iwanow - Sasha; Tiger Haynes - Lionel's grandfather; Edye Byrde - Lionel's Mother; Robert Macbeth - Lionel's Stepfather; Alexander Beniaminov - Vladimir's grandfather; Kim Chan - Chinese Customer; Anthony Cortino - Male Clerk; Stephanie Cotsirilos - Veronica Cohen; Michael Greene - Texan; Thomas Ikeda - Korean Cab Driver; Donna Ingram-Young - Lelanne; George Kelly - Wild Bill Hawthorne; Ludmila Kramarevsky - Vladimir's Mother; Rosetta Le Noire - The Judge; Betsy Mazursky - Bloomingdale's Manager; Paul Mazursky - Dave; Luis Ramos - Mexican Dishwasher; Antonia Rey - Counter Woman at McDonald's; Jacques Sandulescu - Truck Driver; Yakov Smirnoff - Lev; Sam Stoneburner - Panama Hat; Fred Strother - Bill; Olga Talyn - Svetlana; Ivo Vrzal - Vladimir's Father; Lyman Ward - Agent Williams; Eric Orbom - Young Frenchman; Barbara Montgomery - Mrs. Marlowe; Paul Davidovsky - Russian Man; Emil Feist - Circus Performer; Michael T. Laide - Waiter at Reception; Joe Lynn - Mean Man on Subway; Sam Moses - Dr. Reddy; Joy Todd - Blanche; Vladimir Tukan - Strong Man; Sal Carollo - Uncle Sal; Armand Dahan - Iranian; Murray Grand; Linda Kerns - Fat Lady at Bloomingdale's; Donald King; Dana Lorge - Wanda; Juanita Mahone; Jose Rabelo - Supermarket Clerk; Royce Rich - Bloomingdale's Cop; Filomena Spagnuolo - Uncle Sal's Mother; Christopher Wynkoop - Agent Ross

Credit

Peter Rothe - Art Director, Michael Molly - Art Director, Albert Wolsky - Costume Designer, Alex Hapsas - First Assistant Director, Paul Mazursky - Director, Richard Halsey - Editor, David McHugh - Composer (Music Score), Waylon Jennings - Songwriter, David McHugh - Songwriter, Pato Guzman - Production Designer, Paul Mazursky - Producer, Geoffrey Taylor - Producer, Steven Jordan - Set Designer, Dennis L. Maitland - Sound/Sound Designer, Paul Mazursky - Screenwriter, Leon Capetanos - Screenwriter, Andreas Grosch - Production Assistant, Stephen A. Hope - Music Editor, Michael Dennison - Costumes Supervisor

Plot

It's a bittersweet story set against the backdrop of the Cold War pre-perestroika years of the early 1980s. Vladimir Ivanov (Williams) a saxophonist with the Moscow circus, ekes out a living but is hipper happy. He lives in a crowded apartment with his entire extended family, with no privacy to express his love for his girlfriend. He sucks up to his superior, standing in line for hours to buy shoes to obtain his favor. He cruises the streets, scrounging for black market gasoline for his tiny car. He buffers between his crazy grandfather and the KGB, who want to arrest him for shouting anti-Soviet slogans out the window.

As a rare treat, the circus troupe is sent to perform in New York City. Ivanov's clown friend (played by Elya Baskin), who has talked of little else but defecting, changes his mind at the last minute, and Ivanov, who had opposed the scheme as reckless and foolhardy suddenly decides to do it. He hides behind a perfume counter at Bloomingdale's, his head inadvertently nudging the pretty clerk's backside under her skirt. In a scene of comic drama and nobility, Williams stands up to his Soviet boss and demands asylum in the United States.

From here, the movie takes an unexpected turn, as life in the Big Apple is not what Ivanov had expected. He must find a job, he speaks very little English, he's lonely and disoriented and afraid of being forcibly repatriated. He is forced to live in terribly poor neighborhoods, takes low paying and menial jobs, and finds that his welcome is not as warm as expected from Americans. In the end, although he finds that the American Dream isn't what it seems, he learns that it can be whatever he wants it to be. The last scene is a poignant shot of Vladmir playing his saxophone on the street--something he could never have aspired to do in Moscow.

Trivia

The film features the late Soviet comedic actor Saveliy Kramarov, as a KGB officer, in one of his first Western film roles. Ironically, Kramarov was a Russian comedian who gave up a successful film career in his homeland for religious freedom and bit parts in films in the United States. He made 42 films in the former Soviet Union before he was allowed to leave in the early 1980s. This reality seems to mirror Vladimir's defection to the U.S. in the film.

The three Russian actors; Saveliy Kramarov, Oleg Rudnik and Elya Baskin also appear together in the film 2010 as cosmonauts. Kramarov and Rudnik play the two KGB agents always shadowing Vladimir and Elya Baskin plays Vladimir's friend the circus clown. Stand up comedian, Yakov Smirnoff, also has a minor role in the film.

Moscow on the Hudson