Dead Souls' Vacation (2020)

Twenty years ago, in Tbilisi, Georgia, Levan Svanidze was somebody. He had made a name for himself as a talented bass player, but now he's 45, broke and living with his elderly mother in a tiny studio apartment. Sharing only 14 square metres, they literally could not be any closer. Lamara occupies herself with her son's meals and appearance and regales him with the same stories about her late husband and her love for Stalin on endless repeat. Distraught over who Levan might be seeing when he does venture out to sell his CD, she calls his cell phone ceaselessly until he returns. Too young to retire, but too old to be cool again, Levan is stuck, and with no one else to share her memories, Lamara holds on as tightly as she can. Codependent and cohabitating, this expertly observed mother-son chronicle serves up not only an astute look at one family's dysfunction but an intimately absurd slice of post-Soviet life.