"Can a family-oriented summer comedy “work” if its action takes place in a penal colony and its main protagonists are escaped, murderous recidivists let loose in a children’s camp? Released on multiple screens at the end of August 2009, Hard Labor Vacation was pitched as family entertainment, and is genuinely funny in parts, but it is a most peculiar comedy. It is fuelled by warm-hearted sentiment, a delicate love and a sunny retro homage to Soviet era comedies. And then—unexpectedly—a shocking and violent twist turns this mythical tale into a tragedy punctuated by a hail of bullets." <...>
Greg Dolgopolov, kinokultura.com
