Roots

Director: Pavel Lungin
Russia/France 2005 107mins
Language: Russian with English subtitles

In this tragic-comedy Edic, a conman, develops a plan to charge large sums of money to foreign clients to take them to a small Ukrainian town to find their long lost relatives. The deception centres around the fact that this particular town has ceased to exist and only appears on the maps of the former Russian Empire. Edic, therefore, takes the visitors to another town with a similar name and gathers around him a cast of charismatic characters who are willing to be paid to be identified as sisters, brothers, uncles, aunts and cousins. The town’s authorities close their eyes to this deception and in return Edic promises them lucrative incentives of Western investments, electricity power plants and a thriving tourist business based on the memory of Hassidic martyrs. The result is an unexpected surprise for Edic, the Western clients and his ‘families for sale’. Screenwriter, Gennady Ostrovsky, has created a touching story about human loneliness, family ties, love and hope.