''A Driver for Vera'' (, ''Voditel dlya Very'') is a 2004 Ukrainian-

Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...

co-produced psychological drama film from 2004, set in 1962

Sevastopol Sevastopol ( ), sometimes written Sebastopol, is the largest city in Crimea and a major port on the Black Sea. Due to its strategic location and the navigability of the city's harbours, Sevastopol has been an important port and naval base th ...

Ukraine Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the List of European countries by area, second-largest country in Europe after Russia, which Russia–Ukraine border, borders it to the east and northeast. Ukraine also borders Belarus to the nor ...

directed Direct may refer to: Mathematics * Directed set, in order theory * Direct limit of (pre), sheaves * Direct sum of modules, a construction in abstract algebra which combines several vector spaces Computing * Direct access (disambiguation), a ...

and

written Writing is the act of creating a persistent representation of language. A writing system includes a particular set of symbols called a ''script'', as well as the rules by which they encode a particular spoken language. Every written language ...

by Russian Pavel Chukhrai. The film won numerous Russian awards including Best Film at the Sochi Film Festival. The film's two-country origin resulted in the film being rejected as Ukraine's entry for the

Academy Awards The Academy Awards, commonly known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit in film. They are presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) in the United States in recognition of excellence in ...

Best Foreign Film category for 2005, due to a rule which states, " e submitting country must certify that creative talent of that country exercised artistic control of the film."indieWire November 3, 2004: ''Foreign Oscar Quandary: Academy Nixes "Maria," Colombia Adds "El Rey," and Other Stories from the Foreign-Lingo Category''
Relinked 2011-11-06

Plot

During the

Khrushchev Thaw The Khrushchev Thaw (, or simply ''ottepel'')William Taubman, Khrushchev: The Man and His Era, London: Free Press, 2004 is the period from the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s when Political repression in the Soviet Union, repression and Censorship in ...

Soviet The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

Crimea Crimea ( ) is a peninsula in Eastern Europe, on the northern coast of the Black Sea, almost entirely surrounded by the Black Sea and the smaller Sea of Azov. The Isthmus of Perekop connects the peninsula to Kherson Oblast in mainland Ukrain ...

, Ukraine, a young cadet in the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army, often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Republic and, from 1922, the Soviet Union. The army was established in January 1918 by a decree of the Council of People ...

named Viktor ( Igor Petrenko), becomes a chauffeur for a general ( Bohdan Stupka). Viktor begins a relationship with the general's disabled and volatile daughter, Vera (

Alyona Babenko Alyona Olegovna Babenko (; ; born March 31, 1972) is a Russian film and theater actress, Honored Artist of the Russian Federation (2013). Biography Elena Baranova, known professionally as Alyona Babenko was born in Kemerovo, Russian SFSR, Soviet ...

). Viktor becomes involuntarily involved in a plot by the

KGB The Committee for State Security (, ), abbreviated as KGB (, ; ) was the main security agency of the Soviet Union from 1954 to 1991. It was the direct successor of preceding Soviet secret police agencies including the Cheka, Joint State Polit ...

whereby KGB agent Saveliev ( Andrei Panin) pushes Viktor to spy on the general for KGB purposes. As the action develops around Viktor's relationship with Vera and his conflicted reasons for pursuing it, contrasted with the raw sexual tension between Viktor and the maid, Lida (Yekaterina Yudina), and her scathing attack on his motives rel Vera, the KGB, using Agent Saveliev, plots to take down and ultimately kill the general. Nobody is safe.

Reception

After acknowledging the film's numerous Russian awards, movie critic Ronnie Scheib nevertheless panned the film in entertainment magazine ''

Variety Variety may refer to: Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats * Variety (radio) * Variety show, in theater and television Films * ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont * ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...

'' opining, for example, " hepic ures oddly disjointed wedding of operatic emotionalism and cool aesthetic distance may prove more off-putting than enthralling."

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Driver For Vera 2004 films Ukrainian drama films Russian drama films Films scored by Eduard Artemyev Films set in 1962 Films set in Crimea Films set in Moscow Films set in the Soviet Union Films shot in Crimea Films shot in Moscow Russian-language Ukrainian films 2000s psychological drama films 2004 drama films 2000s Russian-language films Russian-language drama films 2000s Ukrainian films

Plot

Reception

See also

References

External links