Moscow Never Sleeps is a 2017 Russian-Irish drama film, directed and written by Johnny O'Reilly. The ensemble cast stars Aleksei Serebryakov, Mikhail Yefremov, Evgeniya Brik, Lyubov Aksyonova, Yelena Safonova, Viktor Verzhbitsky, Alyona Babenko, Yuri Stoyanov, Anastasia Shalonko, Oleg Dolin, Sergei Belov, and Tamara Spiricheva. It premiered in both Russia and Ireland in 2017.
Synopsis The volatile intersections of contemporary Moscow and the intimate lives of five people.
Cast
Reception Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 51 out of 100, based on 7 critics, indicating "mixed or average" reviews.
Jessica Kiang of Variety compared the film to Magnolia (1999). Brogen Hayes of Movies.ie lauded the "strong performances from its actors", akin to Crash (2004). Noel Murray of the Los Angeles Times likened the film to Short Cuts (1993). Lisa Trifone of Third Coast Review applauded filmmaker Johnny O'Reilly. Marnie Schleicher of SF Weekly mused, "The picture resembles the recent 100 Streets (2016), though it could have used some of that film's unabashed soapiness."
Kristen Yoonsoo Kim of The Village Voice said it is "ambitious to a fault". Donald Clarke of The Irish Times echoed that sentiment. Hilary A. White of the Sunday Independent said the film "does an excellent job". Stephen Porzio of Film Ireland lauded that "as a love-letter to the nation's capital, the movie succeeds". André Hereford of Film Journal International praised the cinematography for its role in a "tense yet effective ode to an imperfect metropolis".
Ben Kenigsberg of The New York Times opined that the film is "dramatically resolutely familiar, even trite". Frank Scheck of The Hollywood Reporter chided the film, saying "the jumble of storylines inevitably results in narrative confusion". Anita Katz of the San Francisco Examiner derided the film for "delivering little emotional impact". Nathanael Hood of The Young Folks stated that the film "manages a brief profundity".
Paddy Kehoe of RTÉ proclaimed it "needs more than such rich poetic moments of camerawork". Alan Zilberman of The Washington Post dubbed it "uneven because of the inescapable nature of such interlocking narratives: some land better than others". And Tricia Olszewski of the Washington City Paper sardonically remarked "Moscow Never Sleeps, but viewers probably will."
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