Remote Access

Colour, 35 mm
Russia, 2004, 90 min
Section: East of the West - competitive

Synopsis

A boat capsizes in a river. The father manages to save his son, Seryozha, but both mother and daughter disappear beneath the surface.... Years pass. The boy grows up without coming to terms with this traumatic experience of loss.... The mother and daughter of a well-todo family are continually quarelling, and on a whim the daughter takes a job as a phone sex operator. There she becomes interested in one of her anonymous clients — Seryozha. Without betraying their identities, the pair indulge in endless conversation. They are aroused by the sound of the words, by the variable intonation of voice, by each and every silence. It gives them a happiness unknown, but they anxiously avoid meeting in order to preserve this feeling of joy emanating from an almost mystical rapture, and to ensure that the charm and fragility of hope will not fade.... 

About the director

Svetlana Proskurina (b. 1948, Krivets, Novgorod District) graduated in dramatic arts from the Leningrad State Institute of Drama, Music and Cinematography (1976) and from Moscow’s Higher Courses for Scriptwriters and Directors (1981). She has shot the documentaries Peasant (Krestyanin), Islands. Alexander Sokurov (Ostrova. Aleksandr Sokurov), Russian Ark (Russkiy Kovcheg, 2002), You Live in the Right Way, Peasant! (Pravilno zhivyote, krestyanin!, 2003). She debuted in features with Children’s Playground (Detskaya ploshchadka, 1986), and for Accidental Waltz (Sluchayny vals, 1998) she won the Golden Leopard at Locarno and the Golden Panther at the Marseille IFF. Then came Reflections in a Mirror (Otrazheniye v zerkale, 1992) and TV documentaries for the series “Lives of Remarkable People” (“Zhizn zamechatelnykh lyudei,” 1997)) on two top artists: Mikhail Shemyakin. The Chase for Pure Time (Mikhail Shemyakin. V pogone za chistym vremenyem, 1997) and Ernst Neizvestny. Dialogues (Ernst Neizvestny. Dialogi, 1997).