Achtung!!! May contain spoilers.
I must admit that, having seen quite a few lacklustre Australian flicks in recent times, I tend to shudder a bit whenever I see the words "Australian Film Finance Corporation" anywhere in the opening credits of a locally-produced flick. "Russian Doll" was no exception and sadly, it seemed, my apprehension was justified this time.
This movie revolves around a former private-investigator called Harvey who becomes thoroughly disillusioned with his work after he accidentally spies (with his hi-tech surveillance equipment) his girlfriend cheating on him. (As soon as she realizes that she has been seen by him, she gives him the most infuriatingly stupid-looking grin and waves at him: something that made me feel like jumping into the movie and smacking her in the face). Throwing in his job, therefore, he decides to devote his time to writing a crime novel instead, and while doing this, is persuaded by an old friend of his called Ethan to enter into a marriage of convenience with a Russian woman called Katia. Katia is Ethan's mistress and the man wants Harvey to marry her so that she can remain in the country. With many misgivings, Harvey agrees to go along with the plan, and his soon-to-be "Russian bride" moves in with him. At first, they can't stand being in the same room with one another, but after a while, they start getting used to each other and well, you can probably guess what happens after that.
Overall, this movie was nothing terribly original, and the longer it went, the more bored I grew. One thing that disappointed me was the way that Katia looked more Greek than Russian (even though she was played by a real Russian actress from what I heard). Having seen enough "wog" movies (one of my country's more unusual exports) over the years, I was sort of disappointed that I seemed to be seeing yet another wog in a movie that wasn't even about them. I was also disappointed by the way that Harvey fell for her rather than her friend Liza, who was a real spunk in my opinion and seemed to have more genuine feelings towards him than Katia did.
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