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Russian Dolls
Russian Dolls
	French theatrical release poster
French	Les Poupées russes
Directed by	Cédric Klapisch
Written by	Cédric Klapisch
Produced by	Matthew Justice; Bruno Levi;
Starring	Romain Duris; Audrey Tautou; Cécile de France; Kelly Reilly; Kevin Bishop; Evgenia Obraztsova;
Cinematography	Domininque Colon
Edited by	Francine Sandberg
Music by	Loïk Dury; Laurent Levesque;
Production; companies	Ce qui me meut; StudioCanal; France 2 Cinéma; Lunar Films;
Distributed by	Mars Distribution (France); Cinefile World (United Kingdom);
Release dates	15 June 2005 (France); 5 May 2006 (United Kingdom);
Running time	125 minutes
Countries	France; United Kingdom;
Languages	French; English; Russian; Spanish; Italian;
Budget	$10.7 million
Box office	$23.7 million

Russian Dolls (French: Les Poupées russes) is a 2005 romantic comedy-drama film, the sequel to L'Auberge Espagnole (2002) and the second instalment in the Spanish Apartment trilogy, which is concluded with Chinese Puzzle (Casse-tête chinois, 2013). Cédric Klapisch wrote and directed the film, whose settings include Paris, London, Saint Petersburg and Moscow. Klapisch makes use of digital and split-screen effects in the film, as well as non-linear narrative.^[3]

Plot

The film begins with friends from L'Auberge espagnole meeting in Saint Petersburg at the wedding of Wendy's brother, William. Xavier begins to reminisce about the events of the past several years.

Xavier and Martine have split up and Martine has since had a child and become a committed environmental activist. For financial reasons, Xavier becomes a writer for pulp romantic novels and a ghostwriter, writing the autobiographies of celebrities. Martine criticizes his pulp novel work as being unrealistic and corny. Despite agreeing with this, Xavier replies that he earns good money. In Paris, Xavier has a brief affair with Kassia, a sales clerk from Senegal. When Xavier's grandfather asks about Xavier's fiancée, he asks his friend Isabelle, who is a lesbian, to pose as his fiancée.

In Paris, Xavier runs into Wendy, who has become an accomplished television writer. She is currently involved in an unhealthy relationship. A TV assignment later takes Xavier to London where he had requested to work with Wendy. Xavier is given the chance to ghost write an autobiography of Celia Shelburn, a successful young model, whom he visits on a number of occasions. On one of these visits Xavier and Celia kiss before sleeping together while looking at the boats on the River Seine. The film shows Xavier and Wendy's attraction to each other growing before developing into a physical relationship. Xavier fights with Wendy's boyfriend which results in Xavier throwing him out.

Wendy's brother William has fallen in love with Natasha, a Russian ballerina. He spends a year learning Russian to try to win her over. He succeeds and moves to be with her in Saint Petersburg. Xavier and Wendy go to Russia to stay with William and Natasha. Natasha takes them to see the Street of Ideal Proportions, a street on which the buildings are the same height as the street's width and the street's length is ten times its width. Xavier and Wendy's relationship is going well until Celia calls Xavier and asks him to visit her as she is staying in Moscow. Xavier goes to visit Celia, telling Wendy that he has to see a publisher in Moscow. Xavier does not know that Wendy had looked at his cellphone and seen that the caller was another woman, not the publisher. Saying goodbye at the train station, Wendy tells Xavier what she has seen and explains her true feelings. Xavier is stunned and doesn't move from the train as Wendy walks away crying.

In Moscow, Celia and Xavier meet up and sleep together again but some of the attraction between them has gone. Later at a club she asks Xavier to get her a glass of milk. While he is at the bar, Celia runs into some old friends and reluctantly goes with them to another party. After failing to contact one another that night, Xavier and Celia never meet again.

Celia can be seen to represent an ideal woman, the type of unattainable fantasy that Xavier has been seeking his whole life. Xavier is aware that, like the Street of Ideal Proportions, she is ultimately uninteresting in her perfection. Xavier subsequently returns to St. Petersburg but finds that Wendy is avoiding him as she is convinced that he had an affair while in Moscow.

Towards the end of the film, the scene returns to William and Natasha marrying in front of family members and the characters introduced in L'Auberge Espagnole. Wendy's divorced parents begin to squabble during the reception. Wendy has been avoiding Xavier during the time leading up to the wedding, but she is unhappy at seeing her parents arguing and lets Xavier comfort her. He apologises for his past behaviour and the film ends with Xavier and Wendy embracing at Waterloo Station.

Cast

Romain Duris as Xavier
Kelly Reilly as Wendy
Audrey Tautou as Martine
Cécile de France as Isabelle
Kevin Bishop as William
Evgenia Obraztsova as Natasha
Irene Montalà as Neus
Gary Love as Edward
Lucy Gordon as Celia Shelburn
Aïssa Maïga as Kassia
Martine Demaret as Xavier's mother
Pierre Cassignard as Platane
Olivier Saladin as Gérard
Pierre Gérald as Xavier's grandfather
Zinedine Soualem as M. Boubaker
Hélène Médigue as Madame Vanpeteguem
Carole Franck as the TV producer
Robert Plagnol as the TV writer
Nicolas Briançon as the TV director
Frédérique Bel as Barbara
Florence d'Azémar as Isabelle's friend
Lannick Gautry as the snowboarder

Reception

The film was generally received well by critics, with a 72% fresh rating by the review aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes and a score of 67 from Metacritic.