Bury Me Behind the Baseboard
Pavel Sanaev (novella), Sergei Snezhkin (director)
Opening my eyes, I was horrified by my awakening and did everything in my power to fall back asleep, to prolong this day as much as possible, knowing that I would have to live through it just to face another identical one tomorrow.
The film *Bury Me Behind the Baseboard* vividly and emotionally portrays the theme of ambivalent parental love. The atmosphere of the movie is steeped in fear, hatred, helplessness, and genuine sympathy for the main character—Sasha Savelyev, an 8-year-old boy.
The grandmother took Sasha in to "protect" him from her "wayward" daughter. Her "selfless" love manifests in her need to care for Sasha, treating every possible illness ("I was treated for everything, but I didn’t fall ill from everything..." — Sasha Savelyev), shielding him from drafts, dust, infections, and, at the same time, from freedom, joy, and childhood...
Alongside this care, the grandmother regularly "feeds" the boy feelings of insignificance, powerlessness, guilt, and hatred toward his mother—a kind of "toxic cocktail" of contradictory emotions entering the body of an 8-year-old child, leading to a physiological breakdown of all systems: cystic fibrosis (a systemic disease affecting all organs that secrete mucus: the bronchopulmonary system, pancreas, liver, sweat glands, salivary glands, intestinal glands, and sex glands). There were too many complex and ambivalent emotions for a child’s body to "digest" and "assimilate." The only available way to protect himself was to cough up and spit out his disgust and hatred toward the authoritarian figure of his grandmother.
Throughout the film, I felt a constriction in my throat and a lack of air. The events in the story evoked associations with a knitted, prickly sheep’s wool scarf—something that can warm a sore throat but can also strangle, in the best traditions of sadomasochism. The themes of "care" and "liberation" also run like a red thread through the plot, confirming the heaviness and hopelessness characteristic of codependent relationships.
In short, the film is heavy. It is clearly not suitable for light, casual family viewing. But everyone will likely find something important and valuable in it... I believe it will be particularly useful for parents who must protect their children, including from mentally unstable grandmothers.
