Muratova's Dozen

The UFO publishing house has published a book about cinema with a capital C

One day, a not too sober and not too bad Russian film director said to me, looking into my eyes, something like this: “That’s why I don’t like you, critics... Very close to you, in Odessa - less than a day by train - there lives a genius, and it’s as if you don’t care. They should write at least something worthwhile about her.” All I could do was look away.

Now this reproach from our criticism has been partly removed. Zara Abdullaeva’s book “Kira Muratova: The Art of Cinema”, published in “NLO” in the “Cinetexts” series with a circulation of 3000 copies, became the first serious monographic study about one of our (Ukrainian? Let’s not argue, we’re not Goskino) most uncompromising and talented directors.

The book by Zara Abdullaeva is probably only for those who watched Muratova - from “Short Encounters” and “Long Farewell” to “Asthenic Syndrome” and “The Adjuster”. But there are surprisingly many of these “those” (including judging by the demand for the first monograph about it). A damn dozen of Murat’s full-length films could not remain undescribed and uninterpreted (although so far this has practically been the case). The severity of this “non-recognition” was added by the fact that abroad, despite participation in the top three festivals and all sorts of prizes, Muratova was never recognized. Maybe because they expected “films about Russia” from her, but she made and continues to make films about humanity. Sorry for the high style.

The book “The Art of Cinema” is not at all biographical or even chronological. Muratova, perhaps more than any of the current greats, needed a description of her universe. The overwhelming majority of reviews boiled down to clichés, in which the authors’ personal indignation at being played “not by the rules” was too clearly visible. But where, tell me, could one read that Muratov’s heroes like, for example, to utter the same phrase several times in a row? And the first, even independent, films already hint at “Chekhov’s Motifs” and “Two in One”? Now there is where. “How is Muratov’s cinema instantly recognizable? Everyone knows: by refrains stitching through the fabric of completely different paintings.” Everyone, but not everyone.

The concept of the book in a few words is this: Muratova works in a conventional space, “returning cinema to its pristine power.” Hence the references, convincing in their unexpectedness, to the Russian avant-garde, the experience of the formalists, Meyerhold and even conceptual art. Hence the frequent discussions about the relationship between illusion and reality, the conditional and the unconditional, cinema and theater, etc.

All this is important and necessary. But it seems to me that the main thing in the book is different. This is its own structure - rhyming. But rhymes here connect not similar words, but films, people and entire worlds. Human and animal, child and doll, actor and role - the list is too long... Even the language itself resembles rhythmic prose. Sometimes this rhythm - when the author leans too much on subordinate clauses, participial phrases and homogeneous members - may seem too outlandish. But the more valuable and funnier are the flashes of clarity: “It was a clown’s struggle for a woman” (who else could formulate the intrigue of “The Long Farewell,” beloved by everyone except Muratova herself?) in this way? Or more frivolously, but therefore even more effective: “Muratov’s women prefer to dress up for neither the village nor the city” (this, of course, is about Renata Litvinova, but not only about her).

The author's text is punctuated by monologues recorded by Zara Abdullaeva - from Natalya Ryazantseva, the screenwriter of "The Long Farewell", to Gennady Karyuk, Muratov's permanent cameraman. There is also Schlegel, Turovskaya, Gvozditsky, Dzyubenko, Vasiliev. But the value of these inserts is not only and not so much memoir. This entire very diverse company somehow subtly reminds us of the life-affirming eclecticism of Muratov’s casting. Everything is preceded by a two-page story by Muratova, and completed by the scripts for “The Sensitive Policeman” and the unproduced “Princess Mary.”

The book “Kira Muratova: The Art of Cinema” has another charming feature, which for some reason I really want to talk about. This is her, so to speak, “quotation apparatus.” It does not at all remind one of the sad memorial list at the end of a doctoral dissertation. Everything is used - Tsvetaeva’s line that came to mind, and the arguments of fashionable French philosophers read in smart books, and even Prigov’s “militiaman” - and he came in handy. And even if some of these quotes individually look naive, but together they return a rare and almost inaccessible feeling of cultural unity in modern times. And they remind us why criticism is needed at all.

In general, the book turned out to be serious and sad. The author himself formulated everything precisely: “Nobody denied Muratova’s poetic gift. But few people wanted to admit that she, “having known the white light,” was already waving her hand from the other side.” Zara Abdullaeva admitted. This is probably difficult and not very pleasant. But absolutely necessary.

Alexey MEDVEDEV