Film Festival 09 - Wild Field
Wild Field
Dikoe pole, Russia 2008, 104m
Director: Mikhail Kalatozishvili
Festivals: Venice 2008; Rotterdam, San Francisco 2009
"On a remote medical outpost amid the mysterious and sublime beauty
of the Kazakh steppes, a young doctor struggles to treat whatever
bizarre wounds the wild winds blow in. Working alone, and with far
less than the minimum of medical instruments and supplies, the
detached and resourceful Mitya gracefully responds to a series of
increasingly odd medical emergencies. Although the ranch-like
clinic, vast empty landscapes and casually intense characters give
Mikhail Kalatozishvili's film a hint of the American Western, Wild
Field is decisively Russian at heart, dark and existential,
penetrating yet distant and hilarious and tragic
simultaneously& Wild Field is a powerful reminder that, however
distracted modern life can get, we cannot divorce ourselves from
some essential truths of our existence. Life is still raw, wild and
uncertain, alternately terrifying and enigmatically beautiful." -
Gustavus Kundahl, San Francisco Film Festival
In Russian with English subtitles
