In this situation comedy (‘drôle, tendre et (…) terrible’ wrote Libération) a misunderstanding with very strange and unpleasant consequences for the protagonist is milked to absurd lengths.The story is set on a Sunday in a dreary, anonymous outer suburb of Moscow. The despondency has no influence on the mood of the protagonist, the young worker Kolia (played by Andrei Zhigalov, ‘un jeune acteur hors classe’ according to Libération). He is happiness personified, whistling on his way, but he is bored. There is nothing to do in the area. The mother of the girl he has an eye on won’t allow him to visit. He decides to kill time with his friend. Before he notices, basically because he doesn’t have anything better to say, he remarks that he will leave for good one day. He says it more or less as a joke, but is taken seriously. His ‘decision’ to settle in Siberia causes amazement in the tenement where he lives. The bored neighbourhood comes to life and everyone prepares for a grand send-off. Kolia seems paralysed with amazement about what his bluff has brought about. His definitive departure is unavoidable as his friends and neighbours take every stick of furniture and all his possessions from his room; he won’t need them anyway. Kolia doesn’t even get a chance to say that he doesn’t really want to leave at all.In a humorous and satirical way, Dostal illustrates the disorganisation of present-day Russia and the everyone-for-himself mentality which this leads to.
