My Perestroika (2010)

92% of critics liked it
(25 reviews)
80% of users liked it
(1,039 ratings)

International Film Circuit is proud to present US Theatrical release of MY PERESTROIKA, Robin Hessman's intimate and lovingly crafted portrait of the last generation of Soviet children brought up behind the Iron Curtain. Since premiering at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival, the film has screened at… More International Film Circuit is proud to present US Theatrical release of MY PERESTROIKA, Robin Hessman's intimate and lovingly crafted portrait of the last generation of Soviet children brought up behind the Iron Curtain. Since premiering at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival, the film has screened at some of the world's top documentary showcases, including the Full Frame Festival (Filmmaker Award), Silverdocs (Special Jury Award), New Directors/New Films, Sheffield Doc/Fest, Rotterdam Film Festival and IDA's DocuWeek in Los Angeles. MY PERESTROIKA will open in New York on Wednesday, March 23 at IFC Center and in Los Angeles on April 15. Many other cities will follow.
When the USSR broke apart in 1991, a generation of young people faced a new realm of possibilities. An intimate epic about the extraordinary lives of this last Soviet generation, Robin Hessman's feature documentary debut tells the stories of five Moscow schoolmates who were brought up behind the Iron Curtain, witnessed the joy and confusion of glasnost, and reached adulthood right as the world changed around them. Through candid first-person testimony, revealing verité footage, and vintage home movies, Hessman, who spent many years living in Moscow, reveals a Russia rarely ever seen on film, where people are frank about their lives and forthcoming about their country. Engaging, funny, and positively inspiring, in MY PERESTROIKA politics is personal, honesty overshadows ideology, and history progresses one day, one life at a time. -- (C) International Film Circuit

Play Trailer

Rating, Runtime: Unrated, 1 hr. 28 min.
Directed By: Robin Hessman
Genres: Documentary, Special Interest

In Theaters: Mar 23, 2011 Limited
On DVD: May 15, 2012
Studio: International Film Circuit

Critic Reviews

Liam Lacey, Globe and Mail
My Perestroika has the quality of a candid conversation with long-lost cousins from another country.
Linda Barnard, Toronto Star
Like all of us, they are looking back on the best and most brilliant times of youth. It's a universal longing that knows no politics.
Mark Jenkins, Washington Post
"My Perestroika" is specific to Russia, of course, but the juvenile certainty and conformity it chronicles seem universal.
David Lewis, San Francisco Chronicle
It not only evocatively captures the Russian spirit and the yearnings of a generation, but it also masterfully chronicles the historic collapse of the Soviet Union and its complex aftermath.
Peter Rainer, Christian Science Monitor
The openness of these people is often astonishing -- and a sign of hope.
Betsy Sharkey, Los Angeles Times
"My Perestroika" reminds us that no matter how repressive a government, no matter how entrenched attitudes may seem, underneath the surface there are countless individuals very much like us.
Bruce Kirkland, Jam! Movies
My Perestroika manages to paint a picture of a people twice-disillusioned by their political system -- a uniting thread between East and West, indeed.
Ron Wilkinson, Monsters and Critics
Russia over the last thirty years as lived by the political upheaval generation.
Nicolas Rapold, Film Comment Magazine
A refreshing alternative to many fictional representations of large nations weathering cataclysmic changes.
John Esther, UR Chicago Magazine
Engulfed in a bittersweet symphony of getting what one wants and losing what one once had, the documentary's personal conversations manifest themselves into something greater than a few Russians weighing in on current affairs
Peter Keough, Boston Phoenix
Outstanding...
Chris Cabin, Filmcritic.com
a heavily compacted and yet deeply personal look at the growth of Communism from Lenin through the breakup of the Soviet Union to the election of Vladimir Putin
Louis Proyect, rec.arts.movies.reviews
Strongly influenced by Michael Apted's "Up" series, this is a supremely apolitical film about some truly momentous events. With its "hip" triumphalism over the fall of the USSR, it seems a bit dated given the course of events over the past 3 years.
Noel Murray, AV Club
My Perestroika is fairly foursquare as documentary filmmaking goes; it isn't stylistically snazzy, nor doggedly vérité.
Eric Monder, Film Journal International
Bitter documentary takes the old Soviet Union to TASS.
Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat, Spirituality and Practice
An engrossing look at the impact of social, political, and cultural change on five Russians from the last generation brought up behind the Iron Curtain.

Read all 16 critic reviews

Critic ratings and reviews powered by RottenTomatoes.com

Fresh (60% or more critics rated the movie positively)

Rotten (59% or fewer critics rated the movie positively)

Featured Audience Ratings

Walter M

"My Perestroika" is an insightful documentary that takes a personal approach to recent history in the Soviet Union and Russia, seen through the eyes of five former classmates, an entrepreneur, a manager, married teachers and a street musician who have all gone in different… More
"My Perestroika" is an insightful documentary that takes a personal approach to recent history in the Soviet Union and Russia, seen through the eyes of five former classmates, an entrepreneur, a manager, married teachers and a street musician who have all gone in different directions in their lives. Sadly, there is also a little too much emphasis on very cute kids.(I love how the kids in the old Soviet Union would read books to get information. Those same kids, now grown up, complain about the kids not reading that much nowadays.) From the black and white archival and home movies shot during the 1980's, suddenly with a few exceptions, there is color footage after Brezhnev's passing, and the new world of the Gorbachev years. Change came in rapid bursts. As one person says, it felt like he came back to an entirely different country after he got out of the army in 1986. Suddenly there were punk rockers which could only be a sign of the end.(Kidding!) Gone are the propaganda posters of the old regime, replaced by advertisements for all sorts of products from the west, now available. The only possible exception is the ad for the Putin/Medvedev campaign. Then, there are also signs of history working in a cycle, as the past might not seem so dissimilar after all. Chechnya replaces Afghanistan(neither are mentioned) while terrorism replaces nuclear drills.(While we had duck and cover here in the states, they had gas masks.) After all is said and done, the mood of the citizens, having seen everything, is cynical, not conformist.