A handsome thief dressed in a captain’s uniform seduces the mother of a young son, with their liaison lasting a number of months before the thief is duly arrested. . . As anyone who has seen the Russian film The Thief (1997), by Pavel Chukhrai, can affirm, Toljan the thief symbolizes none other than Stalin, he who seduced the Russian people (the mother and her son) without loving them but most certainly with the inclination to betray them.  And so, to be sure, Toljan is a betrayer.

Thievery?  Toljan steals people’s small possessions; Stalin stole farmland through collectivization—and much else besides.  A message of politics and criminality is in full force here, as is a vision of the worthlessness of totalitarianism.

The Thief is made and written cleverly enough to be unforgettable.  It stars Vladimir Mashkov, Ekaterina Rednikova and Misha Philipchuk, all of whom are splendid.

(In Russian with English subtitles)

The Thief (1997 film) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Dealing with Latino teenagers, Peter Sollett’s largely successful Raising Victor Vargas (2002) is a serious, casual, charitable picture with themes.  The themes are the hardship of raising highly imperfect children when you, the guardian, are too demanding and a bit of a crank; the lure of young love as fearful as it is inexorable; and the odd, fascinating vicissitudes of life.  For a 27-year-old director-writer, Sollett has done something indubitably impressive.  Non- and semi-professionals make up the fine cast, and canny control lies behind the multiple shots.  Sollett’s script is character-driven and unsentimental.

Cover of Raising Victor Vargas

The actors in this week’s Jane the Virgin (April 27) really get to emote.  And why wouldn’t they?  The episode, Chapter 20, is replete with figurative wrestling matches as well as a literal one (which, like everything else in the show, is not allowed to become boring).  Petra, egregiously lying, locks horns with Jane, and there is unfortunate stuff between Xiomara and Rogelio too.  Meanwhile, Magda (Priscilla Barnes) does not yet get her comeuppance since an illegal-immigrant wrinkle is tossed in to complicate matters.  (Inevitable, huh?)

Speaking of emoting, it is flatly gratifying what kind of range Gina Rodriguez (Jane) exhibits in this episode.  Jaime Camil, Andrea Navedo and a couple of others are able to handle the range requirement also.  As a police detective, Brett Dier is surprisingly believable, and Barnes is chillingly sober.

The Jaume Collet-Serra movie, Run All Night (2015), held me for a long time with its rowdy drama (now that’s a car chase sequence), but then it turned into a tired Liam Neeson picture rather too much like one of the Taken flicks.

The mobster’s cruel disloyalty to a friend is an okay subject, but Liam-and-his-film-family, with their need to work things out, isn’t.  Yep, there’s an estranged son.  Kill me now, mobster!

I’ve been staying away from novels that are primarily about human relationships.    I see all the relationships, mostly male-female, I need to see on the CW’s Jane the Virgin.

Episode 19 (a.k.a. Chapter 19) on Monday night, April 20th, brought us breakups: between Jane and Rafael, et al., and was an especially interesting episode.  And a rich one.  Now that Jane is sad and free, her ex-fiance Michael is again drawn to her—and, I might add, drawn away from his fellow police officer Nadine, who deliberately blows it in the pair’s current case.  She has fears, you see:  some of these people encounter some really deplorable violence.  Ask Petra (still winning our sympathy).  Ask Grandma Alba.  (Will Magda receive her comeuppance?)

Fyi, in Episode 19 Jane skinny dips—pregnant belly not visible—and wants to lose her virginity.  But doesn’t.  Why would she?  The show is called Jane the VIRGIN.

Enjoy.