Cinema for adults

In the coming week at the box office, for our taste, there will be no films that deserve long comments. But on the 25th, a collapse: there is Tim Burton's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory with Johnny Depp, and My Summer of Love by the talented Pole Pavel Pawlikowski working in England, and the new animated film Howl's Moving Castle from the creator of Spirited Away Hayao Miyazaki, and sensational in France and received two Oscar nominations this year "Chorists". In order not to ignore the best film compositions, we write about the Choristers in advance. Moreover, they give reason to think about the absence of films for older people in modern box office, which considers its target audience exclusively teenagers. Now it is one of the most pressing problems in the world of entertainment and media.

At first it turned out that it was not the high-profile “Long Engagement” of Jean Genet and Audrey Tautou that was nominated for the “Oscar-2005” from France, but the unknown tape “Chorists”, which collected almost € 50 million in the country. “Chorists” hit the top five “ Oscar nominees for the best foreign language film and although they did not win—it was difficult to compete with the all-conquering Sea Inside by the Spaniard Alejandro Amenábar—were awarded Oscar recognition because they were also nominated for the best song. The boys' choir sang something at the ceremony. Chorus of boys?.. Do such choirs inspire you? Me not much. The girls' choir would be better.

After listening to the song during the film a couple more times, you estimate, by the way, that it is very good.

The second incident happened at the Cannes Film Festival during the presentation of Star Wars: Episode III. Big Hollywood stars climbed the stairs all the way up to Sharon Stone. Suddenly, the crowd roared especially loudly. A teenager appeared who began to actively sign autographs. Who is this? Now I know: Jean-Baptiste Monnier, who played Pierre Morange in The Choristers, an incorrigible hooligan with a naturally fantastic voice. This Morang, as it turns out right from the beginning of the film, eventually became a famous conductor.

Approximation No. 3. I'm going to the subway after the premiere of "War of the Worlds", for a negative assessment of which, see. Newsweek forum—I was both passionately approved and angrily condemned. And suddenly I see one of the best specialists in film distribution. Which at the same time is a rabid moviegoer, which is not exactly a regularity for his profession. “Where are you from?” he asks. “Yes, from the “War of the Worlds”, alas…”—“And I,” he answers, “have been under the impression of the Choristers for several days now.” The praise was especially amazing: the interlocutor praised the film not by his own, but by a competing distribution company.

Thus I was prepared for an unusual spectacle. The conclusion that I draw immediately: this is not quite my movie. However.

So "Chorists". I urge not to be horrified when getting acquainted with the plot of the representatives of the new public, adoring, on the one hand, von Trier, and on the other, Peter Jackson. A film about how a new teacher, a music lover, comes to a boarding school for the difficult to educate in 1949. And although he is all bald and round, a kind of object for ridicule, is clearly inexperienced in public life and immediately receives a bunch of nasty things from his class, the most modest of which is the song “egghead, egghead, you skiff” - he manages to make friends with the class. Far from subjugating him, although the slogan of the boarding school, not too different from a juvenile colony, is "tit for tat", double violence in response to violence.

This teacher, played by a good actor Gerard Juno (you will immediately understand when you see him on the screen that you watched dozens of films with him, mostly comedies), has his own tricks. In response to the drawn cartoon, he does not get mad, but draws a cartoon on the board on the student - even funnier. In response to a song about an egghead, he catches one of the singers by the hand and says: “You sing out of tune like a donkey.” It is this—unexpected—reaction on his part that helps him create a choir in the classroom. Participation in this chorus becomes an incentive and meaning for the most inveterate scammers.

You will object: even from the retelling, it is clear that there is a lot of standard in the film, starting with the fact that the new teacher, in spite of all circumstances, must overcome and charm his obstinate negligent pupils. Yes, I agree. And I’ll even give you obvious analog films from the times of the USSR State Film Agency: from Pedagogical Poem and The Republic of ShKID to the short story from Yeralash, in which the Khazanov teacher comes to work in a violent Sicilian school and instantly restores order in the unruly class of the godfather, demonstrating that he is better at shooting from a slingshot than the worst student. And someone will remember the old "Singing Teacher" with Andrei Popov.

But the standard moves in Choristers are not annoying at all. And while watching, you completely understand that this is a rare (if we talk only about our box office) type of film.

What comes out for us? Either films meant to be box office hits or—limited edition—art house tapes. Both those and others are designed for a young audience (the art-house audience, of course, is older, but not by much). It is believed that in America, 3/4 of the box office is provided by viewers from 14 to 25 years old. As experienced distributors assure us, the age threshold of the audience is even lower, which is dangerous for many reasons: tastes, in theory, will only get worse. Older people almost never go to the cinema on their own, except perhaps with their grandchildren. I have heard many times from sociologists that they, they say, will not go: those who have no money, who simply have lost the habit of going to the cinema. Yes, but they don't offer anything!

"Chorists", despite the young heroes, is a film for an older audience. You could say it's the perfect example of a movie like this. Such an audience, in contrast to our often musically undeveloped young audience, will not be annoyed by the presence of a choir in the frame. She will like that an experienced person is still able to cope with the young and teach them morality and creativity. She will empathize with the hero-teacher, who cannot find personal human happiness and at some point begins to experience paternal feelings towards that same bully with an angelic voice, Pierre Morange. It is this audience that will especially emotionally perceive the conflict of the hero-teacher with the petty careerist director of the boarding school, because everyone certainly had their own bastard boss.

"Chorists" was watched by 8 million viewers in their homeland. This shows that in a country as cinephilic as France is, people don't stop going to the movies over the years. (By the way, the film did well both in Germany and in the USA.) What "Chorists"! Clint Eastwood's Million Dollar Baby, another adult film, has earned over €20 million in France—more than our biggest super hit Turkish Gambit. In our country, Eastwood's film, with all the "Oscar" promotion, did not get even $ 500,000.

It must be said that Americans are very concerned—both socially and commercially—that older audiences are not getting enough of their films. Leading business newspaper HollywoodReporter published an article self-titled "Hollywood Risks Future by Ignoring Adults" debunking the myth that adults don't go to movies. There is a list of films, including such novelties as "Ray", the same "Million Dollar Baby" and even "The Translator", which earned their main money thanks to the adult audience. And examples of erroneous strategies are given, when an adult film lost its audience because they tried to make it “childish” at the same time. The choice of Orlando Bloom for the main role in the historical blockbuster "Kingdom of Heaven" is considered a puncture of the year: Bloom's audience is young girls, and the film is not for them at all.

Our producers and distributors do not even think about the "age" audience. Cinema is only part of the situation. The same strategy in most entertainment media, exclusively targeting the under-25s, has led to dozens of carbon copy magazines. Not only does it smack of age-related fascism. But it's also economically stupid. My friend said well: “Well, why are all these magazines, their texts, their advertising designed for my 20-year-old daughter, and not for me, if I still earn the main money in the family—and I give money to my daughter, and not she to me?"

The release of the "Chorists" is perhaps the swallow of change. It is noteworthy that even three years ago such a film, if we had released it, would be in one copy with subtitles for the 35 mm cinema. Now dozens of dubbed copies are coming out. The rental company might be taking a risk, but someone has to start.

WE ARE NOT CINEPHILES, BUT WE ARE CINEMA BOYS

Today, in terms of the level of development of tastes, we are clearly inferior to countries with serious spectator traditions. What can be seen, first of all, in terms of economic indicators. But sometimes we suddenly show both the breadth of views, and the class of education that has not yet been completely ruined

FILM, DIRECTOR

RUSSIAN REACTION AGAINST THE WESTERN

POSSIBLE REASONS

"Russian Ark" by Alexander Sokurov

Russian figures are simply ridiculous: fees - about $ 55,000, 12,000-15,000 spectators. Even in Argentina, the film was seen by 100,000 people. In America, condemned by the Central Russian consciousness for its "stupidity", Sokurov's avant-garde film grossed more than $3 million, the same amount in the rest of the world.

Fear of "boring" Sokurov. The complete lack of interest of our public in radical experiments: we recall that the entire film with a giant extras was filmed without editing in a single one and a half hour piece. Critics, including the author of these lines, made substantive claims to the film, but it was hardly they who scared away the audience.

"Return" by Andrey Zvyagintsev

The situation is more appropriate. In our country, the film earned about $700,000, but still it is incomparable with the figures of France and Italy alone: ​​in both countries the film grossed much more than €1 million. In America - $500,000. It was rolled almost all over the world

Fear of the audience by native cinema, especially "complex". Our public is often sure that it is impossible in principle to understand native author's cinema. Russian author's film is of much greater interest in the cinephilic countries of Europe

"Million Dollar Baby" by Clint Eastwood

The case of Eastwood's film is unique. Even despite the fact that "Baby" received the main "Oscars" of the year, such marginal films have not previously collected amounts in the world that are close to $200 million (more than $100 million in America alone). Our contribution - a miserable $350,000 - is a sad evidence of the underdevelopment and teenageness of the modern Russian audience.

We go to the cinema to have fun. There are still almost no cinemas for showing art-house, and there are no special cinema chains at all. And Eastwood's film, of course, should have been shown only on special networks.

"Dolls" Takeshi Kitano

Reverse example. Kitano's most non-spectator film (it also, as always, contains brutal murders, but the main content is the mysteries of the human soul and the secrets of color combinations), collected $ 200,000 from us in one copy. Which seems to be a record, in terms of a copy, for the world film business

The promotion of the Takeshi Kitano brand carried out by this time by the press and the correct display strategy worked: for a very long time, in one session in one cinema, but every day. Outcome: constant sold out. Another thing, and this is a real issue of social justice, is that such films (see the film forum on runewsweek.ru) are rarely available outside of Moscow.

"Alexander" by Oliver Stone

A rare positive case. Russia (along with some other European countries) saved the film and director Stone from financial ruin. Our film earned more than $8 million against only $34 million in America. Just something, because in our box office there were more than ten times fewer copies

This is the advantage of our audience: its openness, inability, unlike the American public, to black PR (say, Colin Farrell is still a weakling to play such super-leading roles, etc.). Stone's film - obviously non-standard - was rated in America as junk. Our public voted independently and independently - "for"