In writer-director-star Robert Yunaev’s Fish Also Drown, a Russian immigrant in Hadera, Israel, is trying to keep his dream of becoming a writer alive while his marriage and professional future hang in the balance. Roman Yanshon (Robert Yunaev) is a Russian immigrant scraping by in Hadera, Israel, and let’s just say his life is in limbo. His dream is to write a book about animals, but no publishing company is biting, and he needs to find other ways to make money.
At home, Roman is married to Kesem (Nathalie Lisser Hazan), who is growing impatient because his dream remains unfulfilled. Determined to do right by her, he takes a job at a warehouse instead of working at her father’s business. He says he can’t work with family. He is just as unhappy in the marriage as Kesem is: her mood swings, the constant judgment, and her large collection of dildos. While at his new job, he meets a co-worker who is invested in Roman’s marital problems and promptly gives him the worst advice ever.
If that’s not enough, Roman’s neighbor, a few floors down, takes up his case as well, offering advice that isn’t much better. Hammering the final nail in Roman’s coffin is his therapist, whom he begs to read his book and give him feedback. She couldn’t get past the first few pages. With his book seemingly doomed before it’s even released, a marriage that is crumbling, and a pair of bumbling idiots doing more harm than good, what is Roman to do?
“Hammering the final nail in Roman’s coffin is his therapist, whom he begs to read his book and give him feedback.”
Fish Also Drown, co-directed by Anton Chikishev, is not for everybody. There is a moment that may trigger an ultra-sensitive slice of progressive culture, and yeah, I felt uncomfortable too. Roman doesn’t get rewarded for it, though that may not be much consolation for some. The comedy vibe is basically Curb Your Enthusiasm, except slower, with a less caustic protagonist, and designed to get cringier over time. Everyone around him is pushing and pulling him in every direction.
What really makes it work is Robert Yunaev as Roman, because he plays him as genuinely sympathetic—the kind of guy you can’t help but see as you, even when he’s making bad choices. It’s also a very foreign film in its rhythm and structure; it doesn’t care about American cultural hang-ups. You’re hooked less by one-liners and more by the accumulating obstacles and that relentless feeling of, “Oh no…this is going to get worse,” until, sure enough, it does.
Fish Also Drown is a symbolic title, as Roman is a guy drowning in life — his marriage is a mess, his blue-collar job is a slow exercise in humiliation, and the one thing he actually wants to do (writing) stays just out of reach. Life keeps piling setbacks until it eventually spirals out of control. By the time Robert Yunaev’s surreal comedy hits its breaking point, Roman’s problems have snowballed into a full-body sinkhole of bad timing. It may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but the film never loses sight of the very human guy at the center of it all.
"…the film never loses sight of the very human guy at the center of it all."
