Lilya 4-ever

LILJA 4-EVER

Sweden, Denmark

Synopsis

16 year-old Lilya lives in a poor and dreary suburb somewhere in the former Soviet Union. She dreams of a better life. Her mother has moved to the States with a new man and Lilya is waiting to be sent for. When no letters or money arrive from her mother, it becomes obvious that Lilya has been abandoned. She's forced to move into a tiny, run-down flat with no electricity or heating. Heartbroken and without money, Lilya's situation becomes desperate. Her only friend is the 11 year-old boy Volodya, who sometimes is allowed to sleep on her sofa. They hang around together and fantasize to make life a little easier. One day, hope arrives when Lilya falls in love with Andrei. He asks her to follow him to Sweden to start a new life. Little Volodya is jealous and suspicious - but Lilya packs her things. Suddenly she's sitting on a plane bound for Sweden not knowing what will happen next.

Nominations & Awards

  • European Film 2002
  • European Actress 2002

Cast & Crew

  • Directed by: Lukas Moodysson
  • Written by: Lukas Moodysson
  • Produced by: Lars Jönsson
  • Cinematography: Ulf BrantÃ¥s
  • Editing: Michal Leszczylowski
  • Costume Design: Denise Östholm
  • Make-Up Artist: Jessica Simonsson
  • Original Score: Nathan Larson
  • Sound Design: Niclas Merits
  • Cast: Oksana Akinshina, Artiom Bogucharskij, Elina Benenson, Liliya Shinkaryova, Pavel Ponomaryov, Tomas Neuman, Lyubov Agapova, Tõnu Kark, Anastasiya Bedredinova, Nikolai Bentsler

Director's Statement

lt is very hard to say exactly when or how the idea came to me," he says. "After Together I just knew I wanted to go deeper in my next film. The moments in your life, when you get these absolutely clear ideas, are very hard to describe. I know when it happened, I know what kind of music I was listening to, but I'll keep that to myself.
However, I don't know if it had been stored in my mind for a long time before then. Once I had the idea for the story, I knew the whole universe in it. lt encompassed the personal tragedy — Lilya's — and a bigger political reality. Then it felt like the film was already there. I did some research, but the story really came to me quite finished.
I had travelled very little in those countries before, and initially I hadn't decided that the place would be unnamed, but I knew it had to be a raped society — a collapsed empire. However, I didn't want anyone to say that one specific country was to blame for that situation. Though the story centres on the characters, the society around them is very important too. lt could have taken place in Mexico, because it is about the major gap between the rich and the poor people as well as countries and how simple it is for wealthy nations to exploit poor ones.
We live in a culture, where you can buy anything. You can buy people, their labour or their intestines — a kidney from India or Turkey — TV-shovvs like Ricki Lake is also a trade of lives. My film is about that world. I'm not blaming the poor countries, but the rich ones who exploit them. In today's glob-alized world Swedish companies can move their factories to poorer countries, and pay close to nothing for the labour. This causes even further desperation for those, who don't have anything.

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