Synopsis:

Pawlikowski's film evokes with humour and bitter insight the novel 'Moscow to Pietushi' by Vyenedict Yerefeyev, one of the finest Russian writers of the Khrushchev period, a time when hope for liberalisation faded, and an entire generation of Russians sought escape through alcoholism. A survivor of throat cancer, Yerefeyev needs mechanical assistance to speak, but his dry gallows humour survives intact.