Kolya (1996)

Directed by Jan Sverak
My rating: 2 stars out of 4
IMDb
(DVD, Miramax)

Louka, a middle aged bachelor living in Prague, makes his living as a musician, mostly playing funerals. He agrees to marry a Russian in exchange for cash. When she emigrates to the west, he is stuck with her little boy, Kolya. Bachelor and boy must find a way to live with each other. Louka is more or less a lecherous old man, he wastes no time in seducing a young music student while Kolya is in the next room taking a bath. He is also having multiple relationships with married women, frequently calling them on the phone and trying to convince them to come over and have sex. In modern America, this man would immediately have the child removed from his home. Kolya is Russian, and the Russians are invading Czechoslovakia, so there is some tired and obvious political symbolism. Finally, no opportunity is wasted to play up Kolya's cuteness, complete with "Mickey-Mousing" musical cues during a "lost at the train station" scene.