koncius Review of Vaikai is Amerikos viesbucio

Vaikai is Amerikos viesbucio (1990)

Lithuanian classics - a great movie about freedom

[8/10 · 5 January 2007]

This is a movie about the hippie movement in Communist Lithuania of the 1970's. The movie starts from the scene of an attempt by the city government to bury the river by filling its bed with earth and concrete. And the last scenes of the movie show how the river eventually breaks through. This parallel symbolizes the idea that it is impossible to suppress people's desire for freedom just as it is impossible to stop the river from flowing. The Hippie youth in the movie symbolize the desire for freedom and for happiness in all of us. If in the free Western world they rebelled against the hypocrisy and corruption of the mainstream values and society, so in the Communist countries their rebellion was also against the totalitarian control of everyone's life and the Lithuanian occupation by the Soviet Union. However, one might be reminded that the Communist movement was initially also a movement for freedom and their initial ideas and thirst for freedom and justice were in many ways very close to those of hippies. But the original fighters for freedom, who were persecuted by the authorities of their times, eventually themselves became the totalitarian control establishment (symbolized by the KGB) which in its turn suppresses the new fighters for freedom who dared to challenge them... This is the way of the world - like in the old Chinese tale - the one who manages to overcome the dragon, becomes the dragon himself... Nevertheless, the freedom, the great myth though may it be, is the great force and the great innermost desire inside everyone of us. No amount of totalitarian control can suppress it, just like no amount of concrete can stop the river from running... The movie itself is set in gray and shabby Soviet surroundings, a little reminiscent of those in Tarkovsky's "Stalker". The music soundtrack features some of the classics of Lithuanian rock. The speech of the characters is nicely peppered with some authentic Kaunas youth slang, but sometimes still sounds a bit unnatural. Some acting is a bit wooden and unnatural as well. English subtitles provide a very good and not word-for-word translation, but sometimes are missing (only about 50 percent of character's utterances are subtitled). In general, the movie is great and would be of great interest to both Lithuianians of all generations and the Westerners, especially by those who were into the hippie movement back in those glorious days of high hopes and big myths...