Leningrad Cowboys Meet Moses

I've never been much of a Leningrad Cowboys fan. Matti Pellonpää was the only actor among these drugies. You either love it or you hate it. Some funny stuff here and there, but as a movie too much inside jokes. I'm sure they had fun while making it.

Completely ridiculous, but also maybe funnier and somehow even more deadpan than the first film. The scene where they read alternate quotes from the Bible and Marx feels like both an affectionate parody of Godard and a beautiful encapsulation of 90% of what he does.

I didn't always give this my full attention while watching it, but after a solid start, it didn't command it much, either. There are still funny bits (especially the opening title crawl), and Matti Pellonpaa is great as their "despotic" manager, here a religious fanatic who calls himself Moses. In one of the better scenes, he and Andre Wilms, as a spy-turned-fellow-fanatic, duel using religious proverbs as their weapons. Otherwise, it just doesn't quite catch fire.

A more somber and low-key affair, with fewer jokes and even the music is more downtempo. But I don't think it deserves the low reputation it has. Even at Kaurismaki's worst he's usually fun. There's a number of funny bits as he takes potshots at Christianity, phony evangelists, capitalism, and communism. Okay, so it's not as memorable or endearing as its predecessor, but you've gotta have some love for a movie where someone steals the nose from the Statue of Liberty to take back to Russia.

Leningrad Cowboys meet Moses estreava há 30 anos no Festival de Berlin. Nem todo mundo vê essa sequência com bons olhos, mas acho divertido, tanto que preferi ficar em casa o assistindo do que sair beber chopp numa sexta à noite (fui até o portão e voltei, hahaha). PirateBay.