Mark Reviews Movies: BRIGHTON 4TH

Brighton 4th, Kino Lorber

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Review by Mark Dujsik | January 27, 2022

When someone he cares about needs help, Kakhi (Levan Tedaishvili) doesn't need to be asked twice. Sometimes, he doesn't even need to be asked. That's the kind of man the central figure of Brighton 4th is, and it's his attitude that comes to define director Levan Koguashvili's simply plotted but quietly warm film.

Koguashvili and screenwriter Boris Frumin establish their protagonist as a kind of outlier from the start, as a progression of characters and challenges eventually arrives at Kakhi, a retired wrestler (Tedaishvili himself was an Olympic wrestler), and his sturdy compassion. It's his brother (played by Temur Gvalia) who's in trouble at first, having gotten into a fight and lost a lot of money at a local gambling club in Tbilisi, the capital city of Georgia.

Kakhi gets him a job and a place to stay without asking any questions. It's his job at a gym, actually, which he has to put aside for a trip to the Brighton Beach neighborhood of New York City.

The entire trip is to help his son Soso (Giorgi Tabidze), who went to the United States to become a doctor. For that to happen, the son needs a green card, which means he needs to find a wife, and for that, Soso owes Lena (Nadezhda Mikhalkova) more than $10,000 for the on-paper arrangement.

The short of it is that, in order to get that money, Soso gambled and is now in debt to local gangster Amir (Yuri Zur). Leaving his sickly wife (played by Laura Rekhivashvili) behind (It's what she wants), Kakhi heads to the United States to get his son's life on track again.

That's the basic plot, which has Kakhi working to earn money to help Soso, the son messing up with the gangster some more, and the father needing to find a way to clear things up once and for all. Most of the story, though, revolves around smaller scenes of bonding, community, and assorted schemes. While those schemes could go terribly wrong, they only affirm Kakhi's belief in being decent to others, knowing that decency will be returned in kind.

There's a seemingly random diversion, for example, when a few men in the hostel where Soso is living (Kakhi shares a bunk bed with his son) try to strong-arm a man who hasn't been paying his immigrant workers. Initially, the whole of the episode feels slightly sinister, from the labor exploitation to the plan to abduct the guy, but since Kakhi is part of it, the end result of the incident is akin to a party.

Tedaishvili's performance radiates a sense of easy compassion for everyone and an attitude of unflappable optimism about everything. Kakhi is a good man in a cold and sometimes cruel world, and while Brighton 4th may not possess an objectively happy ending, there's little doubt that it's the one the protagonist would want.

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