Little Vera

Pichul's Little Vera takes place in the starkly different Perestroika period. Amidst the crumbling of the Soviet Union we follow the life of the titular protagonist Vera and her struggle to fit with her surroundings. Prof. Isham asks in the prompt to this blog if we can call Vera a heroine, and the answer is yes. Although she is not necessarily a perfect character (she's disrespectful, impulsive, and dismissive), she induces that sort of mixture of admiration and pity which we often find in tragic heroes in literature. We are meant to understand her desire to be her own person (whether or not we like the person she is becoming is ultimately irrelevant). It would be a little cliche to say that Vera is a product of her environment, but it is not difficult to she how an impoversihed dysfunctional family coupled with a lack of direction in her countries social structure have lead Vera into a problematic life situation. This film is also presented as much grittier than other films we have watched (Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears, Irony of Fate) even when tey are temporally similar, this add to the dismal gritty realism that Pichul is trying to portray.
But what I found most singularly interesting about this film is when Vera attempts suicide. I personally found myself hoping she would succeed in her attempt, yes she would be dead, but she would be free of her f*#$@ed up situation (and yes, that is the only way to describe it). So I suppose the tragedy of the whole situation is that she has to live to deal with the seemingly unmerited circumstances of her own life.