By Alicia Cliffe

Siberian Film

Things go your way if you pretend to be dead

Films and I have a bad track record. I watch them, but not really.

I can rarely remember if I’ve seen a film before, unless of course it’s amazing and changed my life in every single way (such as the Lion King). But I do enjoy them. I think.

Last night, I watched a film that unfortunately didn’t teach me as great a life lesson as to not to cross my angry uncle and to run away from my problems, but it did offer an interesting insight into a culture I knew very little about. The Siberian Education is an adaptation of Nicolai Lilin memoirs that somehow; IMBD gave 6.4 stars (which we know from bens previous post actually means nothing).

The film follows a boy’s upbringing (Nicolai’s) in which his grandfather is the leader of a gangster community in Russia. Through culturally moral lessons, Nicolai has to decide what is right and wrong to help his community to survive.

The gang call themselves honest criminals by, shall we say, slightly adapting the beliefs of the Christian faith.

As a community, apart from the questionable amounts of theft and knife crime, they are bought up with to follow a strong moral code.

They don’t believe in greed or doing anything to gain it, drugs are a nono, harming others is a massive offence (unless you’re a policemen, from the government, a banker, a loan shark, or anyone who has the power of money and exploits the ordinary) and they go to extreme lengths for equality, to protect women, children, the elderly and the disabled.

Although criminally warped, It did reinforce a massive cliché – do what makes you happy (but don’t get caught). But also reminded me of what we’ve learnt about partners: Whatever one persons drive is may be completely different to someone else’s To get the best out of people, you need to understand the ways in which they enjoy to work to keep your team alive.

Oh and I learnt that you can often get your way if you pretend to lie dead in the middle of the road.