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The Fool

Play trailer Poster for The Fool 2014 1h 56m Drama Play Trailer Watchlist
Watchlist Tomatometer Popcornmeter
93% Tomatometer 14 Reviews 91% Popcornmeter 100+ Ratings
Dima, a plumber's assistant, is sent to fix a leak in a derelict building and discovers the structure is near collapse. When he notifies the mayor of the situation, he learns other interests come before ordinary citizens.

Critics Reviews

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Jonathan Romney Film Comment Magazine 09/18/2015
The Fool (Durak) feels like a realist counterpart to Andrei Zvyagintsev's Leviathan, more accessible as mainstream drama, and more pragmatically critical of a tainted system. Go to Full Review
Vadim Rizov AV Club 09/17/2015
B+
The dialogue is broadly generalized, urgently on point, and bracing in its undisguised diagnostic fury. If you can accept its unabashed didacticism, The Fool plays crisply. Go to Full Review
Farran Smith Nehme New York Post 09/16/2015
2.5/4
He may be saddled with an overly ironic title role, but Bystrov is terrific. His cowboy squint and dogged intelligence are enough to give you hope for Russia, although the movie certainly won't. Go to Full Review
C.J. Prince Way Too Indie 06/06/2019
8/10
Bykov's script and direction are flawless in this sequence, as with each passing moment the severity of the situation ramps up the intensity. Go to Full Review
Joe Bendel Epoch Times 05/20/2016
4.5/5
Director Bykov's long dark night of soul is completely engrossing and profoundly alarming. Go to Full Review
Adrian Mack Georgia Straight 02/22/2016
The Fool unfolds with a powerful, if appalling, logic. Go to Full Review
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Audience Reviews

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Sean 07/26/2023 It's a drama which portrays emotions like hope, panic and apathy excellently with its cast and setting. Highly recommend giving it a watch See more Karl-Reinhold S 06/18/2023 The movie draws you into a harsh reality of rich vs poor. The fool demonstrates why there is no room for people with morals. In the end, people are the same, cruel, with some having caviar on their tables and others, pickles. See more Siriporn P 03/11/2023 Quite unrealist that the building is cracking this far but no one ever notices it plus that the building is about to collapse within 24 hours. Anyway, the big picture of the plot is good and reflects quite "human". See more 08/15/2022 It is awesome !! The comedy just continues!! See more 11/08/2021 I've seen my fair share of solid Russian flicks. Old or new, the Russians have been putting out solid films for years, and this is another one. A man, the only one left in town with a good heard it seems, finds out that a big building is about to collapse and hundreds will die. He stir it up for the local government and they don't like it. We get to se how he, and everyone else deals with it. It's bleak and cold. It's raw and grim, but our protagonist keeps a small light lit. It's beautiful. Well acted and well produced. Rarely flat and it stays interesting the whole 120 minutes. I read that the man that was in charge of an Russian channel that screened it on television lost his job straight after it was shown. It does not surprise me. Kind of important, especially of you consider how a made up film can be important for something other than entertainment and self pleasure. 9 out of 10 cracks. See more 10/26/2020 Excruciatingly tender in subzero Russian darkness, Yuri Bykov shrieks out a hero amidst systemized savagery, bureaucratic bloodlust and dateless deprivation. By its ghastly overcast & naked inflections, there's a rare hope that spans past the cinema, a statement that's forever passing. See more Read all reviews
The Fool

My Rating

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Movie Info

Synopsis Dima, a plumber's assistant, is sent to fix a leak in a derelict building and discovers the structure is near collapse. When he notifies the mayor of the situation, he learns other interests come before ordinary citizens.
Director
Yuriy Bykov
Screenwriter
Yuriy Bykov
Production Co
Rock Films
Genre
Drama
Original Language
Russian
Release Date (Streaming)
Mar 17, 2017
Runtime
1h 56m