Igor Mantsov. The fool himself

The fool himself
Igor Mantsov

Publication date: April 6, 2004

In the historical interval between Platonov of the thirties and Akunin of the nineties, only one Russian writer really interests me. However, writers secondly, below, then. Let the writers sober up little by little and realize that they are no better than other mortals, no more important. To be honest, I didn’t even want to mention this, my beloved. But then I decided that for applied purposes . writers could be used

A doctor is much more interesting than a writer. Academician Nikolai Amosov promoted productive effort. Amosov said: every single day a person needs to make so many thousands of efforts and body movements. Then for a long time, until old age, clarity of mind, strength of spirit and human dignity will be preserved. However, towards the end, closer to ninety, Amosov changed his ideology. “A person cannot overcome old age,” the academician breathed before his death. “A person is weaker than I thought.” Otherwise, everyday efforts and plastic vibrations are meaningless. In short, don't rock the boat.

Look, a cautionary tale. The point is not that Amosov “betrayed”, betrayed, I admit, I got carried away here. It’s just that approaching death, the main event of human life, suddenly actualized the category of “necessity.” Here is what a man named Boethius said : “What happens in the future is not necessary until the moment when it occurs, and having not acquired existence, it does not contain the necessity of appearing in the future . ” The only "necessary" event that has not yet happened is Death.

So, as soon as this very necessary Death crept up to the academician on soft paws, he naturally felt the optionality of everyday life with its physical education, with its “cases” and accompanying “possible worlds”. Instead of “possible worlds,” Death presents the impossible , otherwise, Fate: an unambiguous linear plot.

Death demands meaning, insists on solutions. However, she herself is this decision, the final analysis . And this is why Death is so hostile to the Living, because the Living, because everyday effort is a free choice, a fork in the road, an accident, nonsense . If you go to the right you will find a horse, to the left you will find a wife, straight ahead you will find developed capitalism, back you will find the devil, whatever happens. Everyone does it in their own way, and it’s pretty bad. And Death is important, flaunts its meanings.

This is what a man named Abelard said : “Two creatures, even from the same womb, do not live the same, do not have the same tastes, do not suffer equally from cold or heat . ” However, this difference is revealed only by Death; everyday life does not provide criteria for differentiation. The living ones are ridiculously similar. Ordinary literature, seeking final meaning and distinguishing one fate from another, is a view from the other side , from the territory of death. Let's be honest, it's a corpse's point of view.

In the late 80s, Rodnik and Neva published Arkady Bartov’s prose “ Something about Mukhin .” Bartov looked at the notorious Mukhin, his friends and acquaintances from the territory of life. It turned out that in this mode it is difficult to distinguish one hero from another! Bartov superimposes a series of human names on a series of everyday motives such as a fire, drunkenness, a visit to a relative, death in water and night robbery, and then varies the combinations, provokes slight shifts and collects the consequences. The plot flickers, but cannot come true. A syntactically correct text simultaneously presents several options for the same fate. This glaring contradiction drives the attentive reader crazy, because even the ancients identified fate with the truth of the statement. Bartov exposes the mechanics of the sentence, which imposes its unambiguous logic on life, fraught with possibilities. .

“Every evening Mukhin returns home to leave the next day as a completely different person. It just seems that this is Mukhin. Where is the Mukhin who just took a step from the door? He has already changed... Where is Mukhin?” As long as a person breathes, absolutely nothing is decided . Academician Amosov died not when his heart stopped, but when he lost faith in daily physical exercise and called for passivity and humility. But, as always, I’m talking about cinema.

Clint Eastwood's painting "Mystic River" in our country was called "heavy archaic" . Well, another disgrace for post-Soviet intellectuals. In fact, Eastwood's picture is an innovation and a breakthrough. Eastwood does roughly the same thing as Bartov: by splitting the protagonist, he simultaneously presents several possibilities .

Three heroes - three options. Good, Scared, Angry. Three boys were playing on the road. A car pulled up, disguised police officers , who were actually pedophiles, came out, pretended to be strict, and took away one, the most pliable one. They used the boy in a forest hut for several days until he ran away and returned. By the way, Bartov has a similar motive: “Mukhin once left home as a child and did not return for a long time. Mukhin’s parents were very worried. They even called the police, but they didn’t say anything about Mukhin. The next day Mukhin returned. As it turned out , he went to the Makaryevka River to help Kuzma Stepanovich Koromyslov mow hay . " There is still a difference, Mukhin was lucky. In the context of Eastwood, Mukhin, with whom, thank God, no trouble happened, is similar to Good and Evil. Throughout the entire film, Good (actor Kevin Bacon) and Evil (actor Sean Penn, Oscar 2004 for the leading male role) invariably relate themselves to Frightened (actor Tim Robbins, Oscar 2004 for supporting role): “What if one of us got into that car?”

It is important to feel this obsessive strategy. Through this strategy, the authors block the active perception of a linear plot , all this quasi-detective nonsense about crime and punishment, that chain of cause and effect that our wise guys rightly call heavy archaism. Eastwood methodically insists that there are no such “reasons” and that the boy was taken away for no reason whatsoever. The original episode is a game on the road - a kind of fork in fate.

What does the director achieve by disavowing the chain of cause and effect and the traditional plot, comparing one “possibility” with another and a third in a synchronous demonstration mode ? He strives to show the sterile “present time,” “here and now,” everyday life, cleared of hypersense, not yet corrected by Death. The narrative underlying the feature film sets the vector of fate. Therefore, every second of screen time the actor is forced to assemble his entire character. The actor simultaneously plays the past, present and future of his hero. As a result, the viewer turns into a hostage of syntax, calculates causes and consequences, reads a long-term chain, and stops seeing .

Eastwood, despite the declared drama, does not have to worry about the fate of the heroes , because there are no such fates . There is no “hero”, only possibilities . The good one serves the Law, catches the killer, and waits for his wife to run away with her young daughter. The Evil One regularly breaks the Law, kills the Frightened One, loses one of his daughters , and inspires his wife with unwavering respect: “Whatever you do, dear, it will be right, you are the king!” In contrast, the law-abiding Scared is wrongfully betrayed by his own spouse . In a fit of rage, he kills another pedophile, dies at the hands of the Evil One, and leaves behind a son. Having pulled a person out of Fate, freeing him from the oppression of “necessity,” Eastwood shows him in a mode of total freedom. You can be this and you can be that. Death will shape fate and give an assessment, but until then a person has no other time than present .

Sean Penn, who lost his daughter, complains to Tim Robbins: “My Katie is dead, and I can’t even cry!” “ But you ’re already crying ” , the interlocutor rightly objects. Eastwood cleverly layers the fabric of the picture, separating syntax and vision. While Penn's hero actualizes narration, Robbins's character exposes the forgery, the insufficiency of timeless narration. Robbins' line brings us back to the present, to ourselves.

In 1997, a structurally similar picture was released by screenwriter Alexander Mindadze and director Vadim Abdrashitov. Under the guise of three men's friendship, their "Time of a Dancer" demonstrates the coexistence of three "possible worlds." Rustic, Sly and Brutal are juxtaposed over the course of two and a half hours. Everything said above about Eastwood’s film is fully applicable to the film of domestic masters.

However, ours go further. There is a flawless, brilliant sequence in the film, “The Death of an Old Man.” The elderly father of one of the heroines (actor S. Nikonenko) is present on the screen for unknown reasons. Dad remains silent, grunts, and laughs unmotivatedly at the young heroes and their wives. Finally, the authors bring three couples and an old man to the sea beach. Young people arriving either from Kachkanar or from Uryupinsk stare at the surf, hug each other and shout meaningless words. All the way, Mindadze and Abdrashitov insist on the senselessness of the behavior of this public: anti-psychologism and behaviorism! An old man hiding under a beach umbrella suddenly starts yelling: “You fools! Oh, fools! What fools you are!” Screams reproachfully, meaningfully, almost evilly. The heroes shrug their shoulders in bewilderment and do not argue. If you want, I will agree with the hero Nikonenko. Fools, two and a half hours of film - fools!

We spent the night on the shore, and with the first ray of sun the old man never woke up. I cannot imagine a better illustration of the above speculations. As soon as Death touched the old man, as soon as it actualized the Meaning, the everyday life of the young heroes rightly seemed to him like complete stupidity, foolishness. This is what the old man hastened to declare publicly.

Now grandfather is wise, but dead. Found Meaning, Lost Opportunities . You won't envy your grandfather.