The New Yorker, arriving in Stockholm with a month’s delay, has been unreadable of late, because nothing destroys my interest in a thriller more than knowing the plot. And I certainly know the plot of this war. So I’ve turned to the online samplings, in effect mortgaging my future pleasures to tide me over during this intellectual dust storm from paper-based pundits.

But it is with great pleasure that I discovered Anthony Lane’s review of Lilja 4-Ever online, and I feel gratified that he seems to have liked it as much as I do; for the strange thing about this film is that you do not just care about Lilja, you come to care about the movie itself. It’s the kind of movie you want to make sure your friends see. I still get flashbacks from specific scenes: the deflated basketball, Lilja in the mud, her name carved in the bench, and that Rammstein music…

But what is up with the name change? Why does it have to be called Lilya 4-Ever in its US release? it’s not as if the intended audience—the usual east coast art-house crowd and not a soul more—are in danger of mispronouncing the name, and in doing so deciding to forego it.