Count Rostov is a mix of Bertie Wooster & Jeeves. Backdrop is formation of USSR. Sentenced to life in exile in a luxury hotel, it narrates the next 3 decades in these confines. To manage this restriction is no mean feat but to dance with it is akin to a literary Houdini. On point juxtaposing minutiae of life in a hotel with radical political events. A masterful vintage portrait of ordinary Russians, it holds you in its gentle spell till the end.