| Kinotavr enters a new phase of development Everything seems to be the same as always. Blue sky, white steamship "Maxim Rylsky", on the deck of which the traditional press conference dedicated to the announcement of the Kinotavr program is taking place. The famous film centaur, consisting of a national film festival (which everyone knows) and an international competition (which is already ten years old this year, but is still playing on the sidelines in the public consciousness), will open on the 4th this year, and ends on June 17. During this time, two competition programs will be shown, a panorama of Russian cinema, several special projects, four retrospectives of foreign cinema, as well as a daily cultural program, in which, in addition to the anniversaries of St. Petersburg, the film “I Walk in Moscow”, Vsevolod Shilovsky, etc., will be celebrated and the anniversary of the Zhemchuzhina Hotel, the permanent venue of Kinotavr.
It seems that the era of anniversaries, summing up, memories and nostalgia has arrived. For example, from the time when, rejoicing in the coming freedom of cooperative cinema, Kinotavr invited not journalists on the ship for an hour and a half, but fellow filmmakers for the whole night - to travel along the Moscow River, celebrate and have fun. Now it will no longer occur to anyone to indulge in unregulated joy with their colleagues over cheap vodka and a simple snack in their cabins. Today, successful filmmakers lead a healthy lifestyle, are picky about their drinking buddies, and have limited time. Perhaps that is why the most serious innovation of Kinotavr today seems to me to be the transfer of the Film Market from Dagomys, where it usually took place, to Sochi. The business part is designed to support the festive and entertainment part, since professionals are less and less inclined to mix work with leisure, and the Sochi “freebie” ceases to be the ultimate dream for those who can afford a normal holiday in much more presentable conditions, away from television cameras and familiar faces.
The presence of the Film Market will allow, among other things, to watch some of the films that could not be included in the competition. For example, Alexei Uchitel’s new film “Walk,” which, according to rumors, has been included in the MIFF program. The mysterious “Koktebel” by the young director Boris Khlebnikov also went there, and so far everyone who has seen it is highly praising it.
However, the competition program of the Sochi Festival quite fully reflects the landscape of modern Russian cinema. Outside of it - new films by Sergei Solovyov based on Chekhov and a film by Vladimir Khotinenko about a submarine; nothing else is expected this summer. On the other hand, the program includes a film by last year’s debut competition laureate Alexei Muradov “The Truth About Cracks” and a new work by Lidia Bobrova “Grandma” - both directors got a start at Kinotavr, then were warmly received by the international film community, and one can expect more from them interesting films. There is no debut competition this year in Sochi. Eldar Ryazanov represents the old masters with “The Key to the Bedroom,” a film of obviously non-festival quality, but due to the lack of a separate competition for audience (that is, mass) cinema this year, designed to compete with “Magnetic Storms” by Vadim Abdrashitov, it is a very serious work as of outstanding artistic quality.
The domestic film process has not yet gained enough momentum for separation to begin: both the cream and the skim are mixed in one Sochi bottle, where there are very weak films like “Photo” by Alexander Galin, “Attraction” by Vasily Serikov, “One Life” by Vitaly Moskalenko , “The Modern Game” by Maxim Korostyshevsky, but you can also find professional, serious cinema. In general, the program can be divided into several parts: films for audiences that do not need to be shown at festivals (this is “Caucasian Roulette” by Fyodor Popov, “The Emperor’s Second Bride” by Svetlana Druzhinina), already disappointing films by talented directors (“Carmen” by Alexander Khvan and “ Chic” by Bakhtier Khudoynazarov), completely new and therefore surprising (“March of the Slavic Woman” by Natalia Pyankova, “Old Women” by Gennady Sidorov).
This time Alexander Sokurov promised to show his next new film, “Father and Son,” which was awarded the FIPRESCI prize at the Cannes Film Festival. Naturally, at the Sochi festival it is out of competition, as a “special event”.
The anniversary international festival celebrates its tenth anniversary with an unusual retrospective: films directed by the chairmen or members of the jury of previous festivals: from Agnieszka Holland, who came to Sochi in 1994, to Vera Chytilova, who judged the competition in 2002. It’s funny that a member of the jury of the first IFF, Valery Todorovsky, became the chairman of the jury of the Russian festival this year. Alena Solntseva |
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