Brianne Todd

RU 385/FTT 386

Film Review: Urga (Close to Eden)

April 19, 2004

At times Nikita Mikhalkov’s Urga (Close to Eden) (1991) resembles an anthropological documentary as it portrays the simple lifestyle of a Mongolian family living in contemporary rural China. As the patriarch of his family, Gombo struggles with the decision to bring his family into the 20^th century without compromising their traditional way of life and their ancestral heritage. Even as Gombo shares stories of Genghis Khan with his son, his wife Pagma urges him to buy a television. The family’s peaceful solitude is broken when a Russian truck driver named Sergei accidentally crashes his truck into a nearby lake. Even though Sergei symbolizes the arrival of the modern world, Gombo recognizes a familiar nostalgia for the past in his new acquaintance.

Towards the beginning of the film, Mikhalkov utilizes a montage of the family interacting with nature to emphasize their contentment with their simple existence on the steppes. The camera slowly zooms out from a long shot of the family’s yurt and the surrounding buildings. The shot continues until the buildings appear as small dots in the middle of a vast sea of yellow grass under a clear blue sky. Mongolian flute music accompanies the shot and other sound effects include horses neighing, a windmill clanking, and dragonflies buzzing their wings. Bouin asks Gombo to tell him a Mongolian folktale about the wind as they walk past an abandoned wooden cart standing in the tall grass. Bouin inquires about the family’s ethnic roots, and Gombo patiently explains that they are Mongolians but they live in China. The camera crosscuts to medium close-ups of Pagma and Gombo’s mother weaving on a handloom as they watch Bouin and Gombo sitting in the grass in the distance. Gombo tells Bouin about the legend of Genghis Khan before showing him how to listen to a dragonfly. They sit silently among the waving blades of grass, with only the sound of their whispers, the dragonfly’s wings, and animals in the distance drifting on the wind. With this montage depicting the men experiencing nature while the women weave, Mikhalkov emphasizes the tranquility and simplicity of the family’s traditional lifestyle.

The sharp contrast between the family’s rural customs and the modern world is wonderfully illustrated in a scene where the entire family helps slaughter a sheep for dinner in honor of their unexpected Russian guest. As Bouin hops around the sheep pen, Gombo catches one of the animals and drags it away by its hind leg. While Gombo slaughters the sheep, Pagma prepares the fire and cooking pan. Meanwhile, Sergei sits on a wooden wagon silently watching the entire process. The camera crosscuts back and forth between the actual slaughter and a close-up shot of Sergei’s look of horrified surprise. Sergei attempts to watch but eventually he turns away from the scene. As the family butchers the sheep, the camera focuses on a close-up of Sergei’s back as he shakes his head and mutters to himself. While his words are unintelligible, Sergei’s disgust and apprehension towards this unfamiliar custom are evident.

Just as Sergei is a stranger in Gombo’s world, Mikhalkov contrasts Gombo’s place in the modern world when he travels to the city with Sergei. After leaving his companion, Gombo slowly wanders down narrow streets on his horse. The camera quickly cuts between a sequence of shots that show the streets crowded with individuals walking or streaming past on bicycles, and other people silently observing the flurry of activity as they puff on cigarettes. The city is a sharp contrast from the peaceful quiet of the steppes; it is dirty and noisy with the buzz of traffic, people talking, horns blaring, and children shrieking. When Gombo stops to ask for directions to the pharmacy, he appears confused and glaringly out of place as he is dressed in traditional garments and riding a horse. When Gombo and Sergei later reunite in a disco nightclub, Gombo sits silently as Sergei drunkenly testifies to the miserable conditions of his life. Though Gombo does not understand Sergei’s words, he understands the frustration. As the camera cuts between close-ups of Sergei and his Russian friend, Sergei intently ponders the loss of the Russian soul and his (and others’) inability to remember or appreciate the past. Sergei is desperate to reconnect with his ancestral heritage, and he manages to convince the nightclub musicians to play a Russian waltz from the sheet music tattooed on his back. As the musicians play "On the Hills of Manchuria," a long shot depicts Sergei mournfully singing as couples slowly sway on the dance floor. The camera cuts to a close-up shot of Gombo’s face twice, but it is difficult to interpret his emotions solely from his facial expression. Gombo may not understand the words Sergei sings, but his body language indicates that he seems to understand the emotion behind them. Gombo is willing to become more modernized if it is best for the future of his family, but at that moment he witnesses the desperation and melancholic nostalgia that are the ultimate fate for those individuals who sacrifice a traditional lifestyle for modern culture. Sergei symbolizes the individual who mourns the demise of his ethnic culture, an ominous premonition for Gombo as he appears on the brink of relinquishing his traditional way of life for more modern comforts.