If you have been missing sincere, warm, and genuinely funny cinema lately, hurry to see Here Was Yura. This is the debut feature from young director Sergey Malkin, which first won over audiences at the Mayak festival of auteur films. There the picture took the top prize, resonated with a large number of viewers, and now opens in theaters on 5 February. The film delivers a carefully chosen punk soundtrack alongside a deeply humane tale.
The film captures the raw, communal energy of small indie festivals—the same kind of eclectic lineups where established artists and tiny DIY acts share a stage, where contrasting styles collide, and where the audience comes for a collective, messy, liberating experience. Malkin translates that atmosphere convincingly to the screen: the grit, the damp crowds, the cheap beer, and the sense that anything could happen.
At the center of the story are two thirty-somethings, Oleg (played by Denis Paramonov) and Seryoga (Kuzma Kotrelov), who rent neighboring rooms in a shabby communal apartment. Their lives are noisy and disorganized. They have a difficult neighbor, the obnoxious Andrey (Vasily Mikhailov), whom they often avoid. Together with their drummer friend Cheba (Alexander Porshin), Oleg and Seryoga are trying to get a slot at the Igly festival, which would be an important breakthrough for their small band.
Everything changes when Uncle Yura (Konstantin Khabensky) arrives—an adult man on the autism spectrum whose relationship with the world is childlike in some ways. He cannot manage basic self-care and depends on others. Oleg’s mother asks them to look after him for a while, precisely when the band needs to rehearse for the festival.
Their cramped, chaotic household makes the new responsibility especially challenging. Endless arguments about minor household slights—who ate whose pancakes, whose turn it is to clean the hallway—and complaints from neighbors about loud music illustrate how barely they manage their own lives. Then there is Yura, an odd but harmless presence who does not know how to navigate everyday routines. He wakes them with sudden bouts of anxiety, fidgets with door handles, and once tries to sneak into Andrey’s room because he is attracted to the purple glow of a projection lamp.
The film is built on a central paradox: those who seem least suited to care for a neurodivergent person become the most attentive, empathetic, and capable. Their attempts are imperfect and often clumsy, but they are driven by genuine warmth, concern, and acceptance.
Here Was Yura proves that audiences are ready for this kind of cinema. Despite the film’s auteur label, people filled auditoriums at the premiere. The movie feels fresh and immediately accessible on an intuitive level. It is not heavy-handed social gloom as some brief descriptions might suggest; it’s a film that invites real laughter and, at times, quiet tears.
One notable aspect is how the production approaches inclusion. Some projects treat such topics with distance or excessive caution, implying that only specialists should engage. Malkin does the opposite: he takes the viewer by the hand, makes the subject approachable, and shows that everyday, imperfect people can learn to connect and take pleasure from the process of understanding someone different from themselves.
The film reads as a unifying, detail-oriented study of ordinary life: the small routines, the daily irritations, the private reflections. It encourages greater tolerance, a braver attitude toward difficulties, and a simpler, more empathetic way of relating to others.
According to the director, the story is grounded in real events that happened to him and his friends several years ago. The material felt cinematic even as it unfolded in life, but only later could it be fully reflected upon and turned into a film. Malkin describes the picture as a work about his own anxieties and the stage of life he and his friends were going through—an honest, personal voice translated to the screen.
Beyond its emotional core, the film features a carefully chosen musical backdrop: rousing punk tracks mixed with heavy guitar-driven pieces that energize the scenes. Bands that appear in the soundtrack include energetic acts whose songs are likely to stick in the viewer’s head long after the credits roll. The selection helps shape the film’s mood and complements its blend of humor and poignancy.
Konstantin Khabensky’s performance is a quiet highlight. Without relying on exposition, he brings nuance and tenderness to Yura, portraying a person with limited independence in a way that is credible and never mocking. To prepare, Khabensky has said he did not base the role on direct study of people with developmental differences; instead he turned inward to discover what would make this character happy or distressed, and that inner search informed a performance that earned him the best-male-role award at the Mayak festival.
Sergey Malkin’s debut is timely and resonant. It offers an inspiring message: people are allowed to make mistakes, but trying—and doing so for the sake of others—is valuable. This is cinema that helps mend small wounds and move viewers forward. The film opens in theaters on 5 February.