MOVIE REVIEW : ‘Window to Paris’ Skewers Current Russian Society

Yuri Mamin’s wacky, knockabout “Window to Paris,” a sharp, no-holds-barred satire of the moral and fiscal bankruptcy of present-day Russia, risks being merely excruciating in order to be excruciatingly funny. It’s the kind of calamitous, risk-taking comedy that you must lock into right at the start if it’s not going to affect you like chalk scraping across a blackboard.

Spindly, weathered, straggly haired Serguei Dontsov stars as Nikolai, a music and aesthetics teacher in a St. Petersburg business high school, where he’s regarded as obsolete. He, on the other hand, sees the school system, which has cut arts instruction, as turning out predators and ignoramuses, just as it did under communism. In any event, he’s whipped his kids into a song-and-dance unit straight out of “Fame.”

Nikolai, who has been sleeping in the school gym, at last lands a garret room in an apartment that is home to the Gorokhovs, a combative, overweight family given to a great deal of eating and drinking and singing. They are exuberant vulgarians, exasperating but capable of an embracing kindliness and generosity. They are clearly meant to be archetypal Russian survivors; they may get on your nerves, yet they’re hearty enough to take life in stride.

After a night of revelry, Nikolai, Gorokhov (Victor Mihailov) and some other boozy pals discover that there’s a window behind the armoire in Nikolai’s room. But the roof it goes onto is not in St. Petersburg but in Paris. It takes a while, understandably, for these guys to realize they’re not in St. Petersburg anymore.

Paris has been a Mecca for Russians since before the Revolution, and here it represents Western prosperity and freedom. Architecturally, the two cities are similar, having been defined by 18th- and 19th-Century classical styles, but St. Petersburg, for all its own fabled beauty and grandeur, is shown to be run-down and ill-kempt in comparison to the City of Light. An ancient chart discovered on the wall of Nikolai’s room reveals that the Russians’ “window of opportunity” will last only 20 days, with the wall closing up for another 20 years. In no time the Gorokhovs are hawking Russian souvenirs and even pianos in a Paris square, but their noisy ways draw the ire of Nicole (Agnes Soral).

While Nikolai finds himself attracted to Nicole, she and the Gorokhovs get into escalating donnybrooks, which culminate with Nicole finding herself wandering over a St. Petersburg at night that’s something like the South Bronx--and wearing nothing but mules, a towel turban and a short satin dressing gown.

Dontsov is a warm, likable man who is the film’s rueful, wise linchpin. For all his vaulting artistic spirit, Dontsov’s Nikolai has his feet on the ground; he remains the realist while others get caught up in their self-absorbed flights of fancy. Each successive, frequently hilarious adventure experienced by Nikolai--and the others--allows Mamin further opportunity to skewer some aspect of current Russian society. Having ticked off a long list of ills, Mamin nevertheless is in fact making a plea for Russians to stay home and deal with them.

* MPAA rating: PG-13, for momentary nudity. Times guidelines: The nudity is a quick flash of an auditorium filled with naked people, but the film’s complex style is likely to confuse children.

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‘Window to Paris’ Serguei Dontsov: Nikolai Agnes Soral: Nicole Victor Mihailov: Gorokhov Nina Oussatova: Vera Gorokhov A Sony Pictures Classics release. Director Yuri Mamin. Producer Guy Seligmann. Screenplay by Mamin, Arkadi Tigai. Cinematographers Sergei Nekrassov, Anatoli Lapchov. Editors Olga Andrianova. Costumes Natalya Zamakhina. Music Yuri Mamin, Aleksei Zalivalov. Set designer Vera Zelinskaia. In Russian and French, with English subtitles. Running time: 1 hour, 31 minutes.

* In limited release at the Royal Theater, 11523 Santa Monica Blvd., West Los Angeles. (310) 477-5581; will open Feb. 24 at the Port Theater, 2965 E. Coast Highway, Corona del Mar, (714) 673-6260.