Review of the lyrical comedy “Like the Stars” by Maria Loiter

The lyrical comedy “Like Stars” is being released, a full-length directorial debut by Maria Loiter, which won the audience award at the Spirit of Fire festival in Khanty-Mansiysk. The slightly awkward heroines of the film and their friendship turned out to be pretty and Julia Shagelman.

A beautiful young woman in a smart white suit, hat and high-heeled shoes purposefully floats past a crowd of aspiring actors in sweatshirts and jeans gathered at the door of the film studio. Her suitcase is plastered with Hollywood stickers, silhouettes of the Oscars and the Statue of Liberty hinting at where her ambitions are heading, while overly chosen attire betrays desperate provinciality. Indeed, Sonya (Natalya Zemtsova) came to Moscow from Omsk, where she played Nastasya Filippovna and Bulgakov’s Margarita in the theater. But in these roles and in general in her hometown it became crowded, so she was determined to start acting in films, conquer Moscow, and then Hollywood. Moreover, this must be done as soon as possible, because Sonya is already thirty, and this is a critical age for an actress: you will not have time to look back, as you will only be offered the roles of mothers, and soon grandmothers.

The first round of knocking on the thresholds of the studio does not bring any results, and Sonya, rejected by everyone, falls asleep right in her chic suit on the sofa in the hall, from where the watchman puts her out. At the bus stop, a funny girl with pink hair (Nadezhda Ivanova) notices her and instantly recognizes a restless homeless soul under the guise of a pseudo-movie star. She shares a bun with Sonya, and then offers to spend the night at her place – in an apartment in an old house in the very center, inherited from her parents, who moved from the capital somewhere to distant seas.

The new acquaintance’s name is Masha, and she is also an actress. Only, unlike Sonya, she is completely unsure of her own beauty and career prospects. In order not to be subjected again and again to other people’s evaluating views, requirements for appearance and inevitable refusals, she chose a relatively safe, although not bringing either fame or income, a niche – voicing cartoons. Behind the scenes, you can not be afraid to be funny, strange, wear what you want, eat what you like and not try to pretend to be an adult woman, which Masha, at twenty-eight, is in no hurry to become.

Despite the difference in characters and life aspirations, the girls quickly become friends and confide their innermost dreams and fears to each other. They have no money, Sonya has no roles either, but together they have fun and it’s easy. Even when the energetic Omsk woman introduces her own rules into the life of the soft and somewhat passive Masha, she buys sexy outfits for her last money, makes her do exercises and, overcoming the resistance of her friend, arranges a birthday party for her. It is there that the heroines meet the casting director, receive an invitation to audition, go through them at Sonya’s insistence and find themselves on the set of the costume melodrama House in the Fog, where their idols play: Christina (Yulia Snigir), according to the precepts from whose social networks she builds Sonya, and Kastalsky (Gela Meskhi), with whom Masha is fanatically in love.

The film was based on the memories of actresses Natalia Zemtsova and Nadezhda Ivanova about how they filmed odnushka together at Chistye Prudy in their twenties, ran around auditions, dreamed of becoming stars, quarreled, reconciled, fell in love with unsuitable men and parted with them. On the screen, the heroines have become older, but they do not seem infantile: after all, thirty is the new twenty, and Masha’s childish naivety is more of a (sub)conscious choice than a script inaccuracy. Their Moscow adventures, of course, have undergone some glamorization, but the truth of the characters has been preserved, and the situations and types from the world of cinema – actors, directors, producers and highly spiritual playwrights from the outback – are very recognizable. And even when Christina is sick at the premiere of a patriotic blockbuster in which she played a major role, any film critic who has watched a number of such films on the job, involuntarily imbued with sympathy for her.

On the whole, Like the Stars is an old-fashioned but always modern story about young women looking for their place in the big city. You can’t count on the support of men here, so you can only rely on yourself, your character, sense of humor and, of course, a reliable girlfriend who is ready to turn her shoulder in grief and in joy, wash down troubles with sparkling wine and always remind you that in your own life, that no matter what happens, you remain the main star.