千万不要照镜子

What is left for an aging, none-too-attractive man whose artistic ambitions faded long ago? The past, once so full of hope, is only a boozy memory of bohemian friends who don’t take him any more seriously than he does himself. Is there any way that he can change his life? Fate, of course, decides for him: one day while looking in the mirror he sees a completely different man, one who does what he wants and indiscriminately meddles in the protagonist’s life. And what’s worse, there are multiple, willful mirror doubles. The hero’s life changes into a succession of bizarre, comic and tragic episodes. To be sure, the dialogue with his own past, with his conscience, and with his hopes for the future presupposes that one day he will step outside the mirror’s frame. And who is actually outside and who is inside the frame anyway? Director Suren Babayan based his visually rich, surreal movie on the novel by Perch Zeituntsyan as an original variation on the classic tale of the mirror double. —Karlovy Vary IFF