Khutsiev's I Am Twenty is a frank exploration of the generation of Russians coming of age in the 1960s, and a portrayal of their struggle to find a place in the world. The film focuses on 23-year-old Sergei, his two closest friends, and his love interest Anya. All four of them face the disappointments of entering an adult world with wholly unexpected challenges and little knowledge of how to meet them. Slava attempts to remain chummy with his childhood friends as he tries to raise a child of his own, Kolia resists party politics at his research job, and Anya cannot take the responsibility of matching her words and actions. Sergei himself struggles to take life seriously, so unsure of the road that lies ahead of him that he has little idea what should be important. A recurring theme is the difficulty of finding direction and learning from one's elders. As Sergei says, the war has left Russia such that "almost all of us have no fathers," and those fortunate enough to speak with fathers can learn little from them. Anya's father resigns himself to the point of view that young people want to make their own decisions, and Sergei's vision of his own deceased father reminds viewers that the previous generation were themselves directionless young men when they died. Even the film's mechanics lack direction. Camera movements are often sudden, sometimes seemingly random, and events that are portrayed lack orchestration or integration into the plot–Sergei's unplanned chase through Moscow and the poetry reading respectively, for two examples. The movie leaves viewers without definite direction, but not without hope. The Moscow of I am Twenty is vibrant and beautiful. Streets are clean, orderly, and bustling with industry. Everything is bright, from the metro to Anya's face during the expository chase through the city, to Sergei's shirt during his early morning walk in Part II. Above all, everything–like the institute where characters study and work like their parents before them–is enduring. Most importantly, viewers are left with the promise that the revolution that drives this beautiful vision of Moscow will continue. I Am Twenty was released under the title of Lenin's Guard, and at the film's end this title takes meaning. Still unsure about his future, Sergei nonetheless discovers the importance of the Leninist principles that lead him on, and of his close friends. As the three comrades split up, Khutsiev inserts a shot of three soldiers walking together to relieve the old guard of Lenin's mausoleum. The symbolism is clear: whatever direction they take, the new generation will take the place of the old as guardians of Lenin's legacy.

I've always thought that a lot of films that were made in the Soviet Union got overshadowed by Eisenstein and Tarkovsky, not to mention by European films from France, Italy, by Bergman, by Kurosawa and many others from Japan. I feel sad when I think about that, because there are so many great films that were made there that the general film loving public did not and does not get to see. The only two films that may have broken out of this "embargo", so to speak were The Cranes are Flying and Ballad of a Soldier. Criterion has been doing some good deed and releasing a few of such great films I speak of in the Eclipse Series and I only hope they keep releasing them because there are just too many to list that others must see.I Am Twenty is one of those films. It was made during the de-Stalinization period, otherwise known as the Krushchev thaw where people had a short period of freedom of speech, which Hutsiev, the film's director utilized in making of this film, where the story centers on three friends in their 20's going through a sort of a quarter-life crisis in the Soviet Union, worrying about such things as where to live, means of getting money, and exactly what to do with their lives - which at the time was unheard of - one of the reasons for which Krushchev condemned this film during the end of the thaw (when it was being released) and most certainly which contributed to this film's censorship.This undoubtedly is the kind of film that speaks the universal language, which I hope would be an intriguing watch for people who can track this film down and watch it (there are English subtitles for it, I checked)Shot beautifully, flows poetically, and definitely leaves a mark.I loved it [07-22-2011, 08:23 PM]

This film is art. Like the Battleship Potiomkin, this Russian film doesn't aim at being an easy film, made to entertain and to fill people's brains with sugary dullness. It's its credibility, the Soviet neo-realism that it uses, which strikes. The way in which the film aims to show what Russia was like, in the Communist years. It's a situation hard to understand for a Western civilization. Russian patriotism, their intelligentsia and daily reality of work, study and vodka.Which is why maybe, seen from a Western point of view, this movie may be not only hard to understand but also hard to follow as far as the concept of time is concerned. It remains a mystery in fact, how the characters find time to do everything or almost everything in one way. How people give strangers none, just by asking. How people seem to be so different, as well as their culture.But that's not entirely to hold against the movie. It's the international realism that bites back the improbability of the film. The problems of 20 year olds, the silent struggle for political diversity, shown by the poets and their poems, and the struggle to cross the line to adulthood.The photography is sublime. The voice overs that carry the movie away are profoundly extraordinary. Sergej looks at the sky and says "There is so much peace in the cosmos". Or the dance in the dark ballroom, Anja holding the candles which slowly become the only source of light. It's all very artistically deep, and it's strange how this film can hold the test of time.Not to mention the chase scene, where Sergej follows Anya, unwilling to accept the fact that their relationship cannot end to being a simple encounter on a bus. Then there's the element of the friendship, challenged by aging.It's not Soviet cinema at its best. Occasionally, the movie slows the pace down and becomes too much to bear. For example, the poetry scene is profound and meaningful, but much too long. The silent walks around Moscow are beautiful and suggestive, but again, always too long, although they unfold great and innovative camera work.But it's one to see, because regardless of the fact that it's almost too meaningful, it's a good watch that draws you and drives you to thinking.WATCH FOR THE MOMENT - When Sergej meets his father, who died in the WWII, and talks to him. The scene involves the atheist beliefs of Communism but at the same time signals to us that some sort of hope is there.

I can't comment too much on the full movie. I am not a movie expert and it it has been several years since I saw it. Overall I found it to be an interesting and surprising view on Moscow in the early sixties. The way Moscow is presented it is not much different than any Western European town in the same period. On the other side, young people are young people with their own, but similar, problems everywhere in the world. This comment is about one particular scene. The chase sequence with Anya through Moscow is fantastic. I had seen parts of it on Dutch TV in a movie programme and made sure I saw the full movie when it showed in an art cinema. It builds up expectations until the crucial scene in the stairway where the male protagonist gets close to Anya, but in the end lets her slip away. Beautifully shot in black and white, melancholy and promise captured together.