'How I Ended This Summer' intriguing and multi-layered

Director: Alexsei Popogrebsky

Cast: Grigory Dobrygin, Igor Chernevich, Seigei Puskepalis

A bleak, though beautiful, Arctic landscape is the setting for this deeply thoughtful, largely Russian drama that considers the generation gap, isolation, personal tension, self-examination and the dilemma that comes when one person is less than truthful with another.

Two men, the more experienced and older Sergei (Puskepalis) and the younger, more callow student Pavel (Dobrygin), share a remote Polar station, sending back often boring information and trying to cope with being so cut off.

Pavel receives a vital radio message intended for Sergei but decides not to pass it on, with psychologically dramatic results.

Often with the minimum of dialogue – even in sub-titles – director Popogrebsky layers the film with a humanity and cold beauty that adds a constant interest, even wonderment, to the unfolding drama.

Star Rating: 4/5