Aleksei Uchitel's film has won the Grand Prix at the Kinotaur Festival. It was quite deservedly called one of the most vivid films made in Russia of late. And although certain individuals had accused the director of blasphemously showing some less-than-pleasant character traits of the famous Russian writer, they stand corrected. Everybody knows that Bunin was no piece of cake, and some know that his last lover left him for a femme fatale named Marga. So everything was based on fact and filmed very delicately: some viewers were even surprised that there were no sex scenes in the movie.

... His Wife's Diary at first had the working title A Woman's Name and was divided into three novelettes: Galya: Love, Marga: Infidelity and Vera: Loneliness. Indeed, a man constantly surrounded by women deserves some sympathy. The writer Zurov*, Bunin's admirer who comes to give moral support and stays to help eat away Bunin's just-received Nobel Prize, is the kind of trouser-wearing creature known as a cissy or a wuss. His masculinity shows itself only in his tepid love for Vera, a link in the chain of "Zurov loves Vera, Vera loves Bunin, Bunin loves Galya, Galya loves Marga". Amusing. But no matter who loves whom, all these basically feminine creatures revolve around Bunin like tiny satellites of a big planet. Their logic, their words, their love are those of a woman. ...

*SITE NOTE: This real-life character had been renamed Gurov in the film.