by Linda Kay

Original Title: Tretya Meshchanskaya

Directed by: Abram Room

Cat Out of the Bag Alert! This review contains MAJOR spoilers for this film!

Synopsis: Kolia (Nikolay Batalov) and Liuda (Lyudmila Semyonova) are a happily married couple living in a small apartment in Moscow. One day Kolia runs into former war companion Volodia (Vladimir Fogel) who has just arrived in the city. With nowhere else to stay, Kolia invites Volodia to stay with them. What could possibly go wrong?

Cat Burglar (Scene Stealer): The couple own a precious tabby and white cat who is never named. As the city sleeps, the cat is snoozing in a window.

The cat wakes up as the city awakens and like a typical cat moves to the bed to make sure Kolia and Liuda are getting up.

Kolia finds the cat resting on him and picks up the kitty, making the cat jump all over Liuda to wake her up.

As Kolia showers the cat washes herself.

At breakfast, Kolia finds something distasteful (possibly curdled cream) that Ludia places in the cat’s dish. Whatever it is, the cat is happy to eat it.

After Volodia moves in with the couple, Liuda looks disdainfully at the messy couch where the cat sits.

When Kolia has to go out of town, Volodia takes Liuda out for some entertainment. When they return home, Volodia sits on the couch and pets the kitty.

As one might expect, Volodia and Liuda fall in love and have sex. When Kolia finds out, the situation turns even stranger when Liuda invites him to stay in the apartment as the third wheel. Kolia remembers the way things used to be and superimposed images show him cuddling with the cat.

Kolia and Volodia remain friends and spend much of the evenings playing chess. This leaves Liuda ignored, especially when the friends stay out of Liuda’s bed so as not to cause a rift. Things get even tenser when it turns out Liuda is pregnant with the father being either one of them.

The strangeness of the situation is expressed with an insert shot of the cat’s face yowling.

Poor Liuda goes for an abortion but decides against it. She does decide to leave both men and sits at a table crying. A sculpted cat’s head is beneath and her tears drip down the cat’s face, making it appear as if the cat is crying. The actual cat is not seen again.

Final Mewsings: Cats know that when it comes to cohabitating, less is more.

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