Translated material
Rules of the one-goal game
The 18th Open Russian Film Festival in Sochi summed up the results
Until the very end of Kinotavr, few people attempted to predict the final prize distribution with even minimal accuracy. Perhaps only one laureate, known in advance, did not raise any questions - a special prize “for the preservation of the Russian film heritage” was awarded at the closing ceremony to the permanent director of the Cinema Museum, Naum Kleiman.Otherwise, the final decision of the jury could have shocked even the most venerable psychics and seers if they had found themselves in the hall of the Sochi Winter Palace that evening. All somewhat noticeable or radical films in the competition program were ignored, including perhaps the most scandalous film of the year, “Cargo 200” by Alexei Balabanov.
Of the fourteen films in the competition, the jury, headed by director Vadim Abdrashitov, chose, in essence, only two - “Simple Things” by Alexei Popogrebsky and “Flint” by Alexei Mizgirev. The film "Simple Things", about which the newspaper "Vremya Novostey" wrote on June 8 , won the Main Prize and the prize for directing, Sergei Puskepalis, who played the main role in it, was declared the best actor, and Leonid Bronevoy, who performed together with Puskepalis, appeared on the silver screen for the first time in many years, he became the owner of an honorary diploma. Described by Vremya Novostei on June 9, “Flint,” the first film by Alexei Mizgirev (by the way, a student of Vadim Abdrashitov), received prizes for best debut and best script, written by the director together with Yuri Klavdiev.
Just one award each went to Anna Melikyan's modern urban fantasy "Rusalka" (best female performer - Maria Shalaeva) and Marina Razbezhkina's "Yar", an adaptation of the story of the same name by Sergei Yesenin (Mikael Tariverdiev prize for best music - Anton Silaev). Despite the fact that both films were obviously among at least the seven main favorites and ultimately deserved much more.
In principle, one can understand why Valery Todorovsky’s too straightforward and genre-bending “Vise” or, conversely, Valeria Gai-Germanika’s overly radical “Birthday of the Infanta” (a semi-documentary story about our compatriots-contemporaries practicing sadomasochistic pastimes) were left out of the list of winners. But at the same time, such outstanding competition works as “Breakthrough”, the directorial debut of Alexander Mindadze, remained behind the scenes, the film is controversial, complex and even, according to its convinced fans, far from being successful in everything, but making on the psyche no less strong an impression than other most successful films by contemporary European arthouse masters from Andersson to von Trier, which evokes simultaneous associations not only with, say, Abdrashit’s “Armavir” (the script for which was written by the same Mindadze), but also with David Lynch’s “Inland Empire”, a film which is difficult, and, according to some experts, even impossible to understand, but any self-respecting viewer, and even more so a film professional, must at least try; “Two in One” by Kira Muratova (see “Vremya Novostey” on June 7) , a film in which not immediately, not after the first viewing, but towards the end of the festival, in a way unknown to science, even hints of shortcomings disappeared and crystallized what was incredible in modern times mastery and freedom; “Inzeen-raspberry” by Vladimir Sivkov, “The Best Time of the Year” by Svetlana Proskurina and “Cruelty” by Maria Lyubakova are films that not everyone liked, but at least they were of interest and caused controversy and discussion.
And finally, the effect, comparable only to a good portion of buckshot fired at the head at point-blank range (or, to use more cinephile analogies, the memorable fate of “Dogville” in the Cannes competition), caused a complete disregard for the most controversial film of the festival (and the domestic one) film year as a whole) - “Cargo 200” by Alexei Balabanov (see “Vremya Novostei” dated June 9) . He, however, after much debate, conflicts and voting, was recognized as the laureate of the Guild of Film Critics and Film Critics, but at the ceremony itself, to the surprise (and, to be honest, indignation) of many members of the guild itself, he was unexpectedly divided into two parts, the second of which went back to the same “Simple Things”. Balabanov’s film had already divided almost everyone into two radical camps. Some hate it with some kind of animal hatred, point-blank they don’t see even a glimmer of even minimal artistic merits, comparing it with the cheap American trash horror films of past years, as usual for this director (but now in some very elevated tones) they accuse him of immoralism and fascism and are generally denied the right to exist. Others (which, to be honest, includes the author of these lines), on the contrary, recognize him as an outstanding, super-professional phenomenon and absolutely certainly the most significant event of the current KinoTavrovsk competition. Emotional extremes are not the best assistants in an impartial analysis, but to pretend that “Cargo 200” was not at the festival at all is at least strange. One way or another, today this amazing film is being released in limited release with, apparently for the first time, an age limit of up to 21 years applied to a Russian film, and anyone who has reached this age will be able to figure it out on their own.
The most offensive thing in this situation is that this situation can negatively affect the main triumphant itself, paradoxically turning a certain part of the film public against “Simple Things”. This is the last thing I would like - Alexei Popogrebsky’s film is absolutely wonderful, and it is impossible to change the attitude towards it, much less ignore it (including in terms of prizes and awards). But it seems that in this case even the creators of the film themselves found themselves somewhat crushed under the shadow of such large-scale delights and almost certainly experienced the same awkwardness that gripped very, very many after the results of the eighteenth “Kinotavr” ceased to be hypothetical and turned from forecasts into a story that cannot be cut down with an axe.