Raw and Grey Brighton 4th is a Poetic Visual Sonnet to Being an Immigrant

(l. to r.) Nadezhda Mikhalkova (Lena) and Giorgi Tabidze (Soso) on the beach in Brighton Beach, Brooklyn, in Brighton 4th, directed by Levan Koguashvili. Image courtesy of Kino Iberica

Brighton 4th is a raw symbolic piece of movie art that gets as close to being in the predominantly seaside Russian Brooklyn, New York neighborhood of Brighton Beach as it gets. Though it is billed as a tragic comedy, I found little humor in the absurdity of its sad narrative. It could easily be in Georgia, where the main characters are from since nothing has changed for them; with little to zero difference between America and the USSR from what the director tells us. Two divergent worlds: maybe the dreary image of Coney Island and the boardwalk along Brighton Beach are the only thing that sets them apart.

Since I grew up nearby the famous enclave dubbed The little Odessa By the Sea in the 1980s which was once home to immigrant Jews of Europe and before that, the elite of the late 19th century who enjoyed the then beach resort, there is nothing portrayed of the enchantment of this place, only its present-day occupants' like most immigrants ability to submerge themselves in the life that they know rather than emerge into the new world. The characters portrayed here are not the more affluent Russians of Brighton Beach who also inhabit the luxury highrise apartments overlooking the water. They are the poor, scratching by on the side streets to survive, not far from the fruit stands and beauty supply shops on Brighton Beach…