Kolya (Madyanov) faces a bid by corrupt local mayor to take his land. Dmitri (Vdochenkov) arrives from Moscow to support Kolya’s fight. The director has been likened to a modern Dostoyevsky, so this slyly subversive film is a surprising choice for Russia’s official foreign language Oscar entry.

Zyvagintsev delivers a compassionate, satirically incendiary’ film. The Telegraph.