The director of the film "Territory" Alexander Melnik speaks

On February 11, the Kremlin will host the premiere of the feature film “Territory,” which tells the story of the discovery of a gold deposit in northern Russia. The director of the film, Alexander Melnik, told Kommersant Publishing House special correspondent Olga Allenova why he doesn’t like “depressive” cinema and whether it is possible to create a new state ideology with the help of cinema.

Filming of the film "Territory"

Photo: Vladimir Maksimov

"By the end of the expedition, everyone was seasoned polar explorers"

Why did you choose this particular subject for the film - the North, gold miners, the Soviet era?

I met people who wanted to make a film based on Oleg Kuvaev’s novel “Territory” because they loved him from their youth. They had the initial money and that allowed them to get started. And the second reason was in myself: I loved this book, read it, kept it, and told it to my children. The novel was published in thick magazines and was a huge success. This was in the seventies, I then entered the Odessa Hydrometeorological Institute and after the first year I left for the Magadan region, to join a construction brigade. I saw the North and was fascinated by it: the Arctic, the Arctic, hills, white nights, stunning landscapes, air, mood and real hard work. And the next year I went to the Ob, and I came across this book - the novel was finally published as a separate edition. “Territory” made a huge impression on me then. And this is not just romance... Kuvaev himself ironically said that romance is for dudes who sit in cities and sift port wine through a straw. There are books that are made according to a certain standard, for a romantic mood, but this book is different, it’s like “Moby Dick”. Kuvaev wrote a book about a person’s passion for his work, obsession associated with work, duty, honor, and dignity. And about people who put work above all else. In the good sense of the word - real, big work. But in order to do this work, it was necessary to walk 500-600 km alone, cross rivers - and we also talk about this in the film. Nowadays it is very difficult to return to a person the feeling that what he does matters not only to him from the point of view of his personal well-being or personal achievement.

Is this idea itself not outdated? About passion for work, about the fact that your business may not be personal, but some kind of public one? We live in an age of individualism, everyone strives to discover themselves, for themselves.

Well, how long does a century last? A century passes, and suddenly humanity begins to look for meaning in what it lives and works for, and asks the question: why is it all for?

A young man will watch your film and say: “Well, what good do geologists in the North have? They sit without hot water, restaurants, girls, for what?”

Birds flying to the North have an internal intention: to fly in and drink melt water, because there is real living water there. They fly to the North to drink melt water and breed. Perhaps, at some level, a person has this feeling that we still have to do some things, to go beyond the limits of our personal “why”.

Did the authorities somehow help you during the filming of the film?

They helped. How else? This is the North. For example, we didn’t have enough people for the background extras, I came to the head of the village and said: “Listen, I need about ten people who have noble faces, beards...” He smiles and answers: “Look at me, now I’m I’ll gather my deputies and everything will be fine.”

These are still personal contacts. Did the state give you money? Ministry of Culture?

The first impetus for the project was given by Sergei Shoigu, president of the Russian Geographical Society. The key partners of the film were the Ministry of Natural Resources and Rosnedra. You see, this novel is a cult novel for every person who is associated with geology and related sciences. Our partners had a direct interest in film adaptation of the book, since the film can draw attention to many professions and help solve the problem of personnel shortage in the North. The title of the novel alone opened many doors for us, since almost all the heads of the largest subsoil use companies not only know this book, but believe that it influenced their personal destiny and choice of profession. We also received support from the Cinema Fund, and we must return part of the funds. But money alone cannot solve all the issues in the North. Therefore, local practical support for companies also played a big role.

Are you talking about Norilsk Nickel?

Yes, of course, about them too. Without their support during filming in Norilsk and on the Putorana plateau, we could not have done it. All Norilsk Nickel helicopters usually work to capacity, and it is impossible to simply rent this equipment for money - you must obtain special permission from management. And you can’t make a movie there without helicopters.

What is the film's budget?

500 million rubles. A lot, but this also includes the construction of a large set (a village of geologists) in Chukotka, and several autonomous mountain expeditions of the film crew, and complex helicopter filming, and an ensemble cast, and post-production of the film in 4K format. By the way, the film was shot on film. All these are components, without which we would not have achieved the quality we were striving for.

When will "Territory" be released?

April 16. In February-April we will travel around the country, we will have premieres in Magadan, at one of the largest gold mining enterprises, in Anadyr, in Khabarovsk. We want to first show it to those people who live there and are the prototypes of our heroes. And the premiere will take place in the Kremlin on February 11. Geologists really liked the film. The Association of Geological Organizations got involved and wants the film to be heard somehow. We will have the first screening in the country in 4K format, this is the highest quality. No one has ever done this in Russia. Screen 30 meters, two projectors, serious equipment.

Where did the filming take place?

In Taimyr, on the Putorana plateau - it’s 300 kilometers from Norilsk. And in Chukotka.

How long did they last?

The first, summer, expedition took about two months, then there was a spring-winter expedition, another two months, and another in November-December, about a month.

How did your actors cope with such conditions? No hot water, no heat...

We had a sauna in both summer and winter camps. A person gets used to different living conditions, and if he is given a minimum of comfort in these conditions, he even knows how to rejoice. We lived in inflatable modules, in tents that were heated by running diesel, it stank of diesel fuel, and it was blowing from all sides. We slept in sleeping bags on folding beds, because there was no other option, and the snow under the bottom of the tent lay in compacted pieces. After the bath, people learned to wipe themselves with snow and douse themselves with ice water. By the end of the expedition, everyone was such a seasoned polar explorer that they could already hand out badges. The summer was generally wonderful. They drank water from the river. They were surprised at how the complexion and skin changed. All the city chaff was falling off. People came from their shifts, had dinner, played volleyball, sat and sang songs around the fires. Then we slept for two or three hours - and again went to the mountains.

There were several filming sites near the camp, which we reached on foot, under our own power. And there were sites in the mountains that could only be reached by helicopter. They disembarked, and he flew after the next party without landing. Everyone learned how to unload from a hovering helicopter. We have a lot of locations in the film, and this is the advantage of the film, because the plan is constantly changing, and we see many different geographical areas. The viewer's feeling and mood are constantly changing: here is a black lake, and here is old man Kyae and his yaranga, and somewhere a bittern is screaming, and then there is a river, then mountains.

I was impressed by the scene when the hero walks along the ridge at night - beautiful, high, dangerous. How did you actually film it?

I can't say it was safe. It was the night of the polar day, about 3 in the morning, a thunderstorm was approaching, Grisha Dobrygin was dropped off on a ridge, and they gave him a guard with a carbine. Because the bear can rise, there are wolverines there. Grisha was given a walkie-talkie, the crew commander had a second walkie-talkie, and Grisha walked back and forth along this ridge, and we flew around and filmed. It was very difficult, at some point the commander of the aircraft dropped us all off, leaving only the operator, because there was strong wind, rocks, difficult conditions, and the operator needed to be close. It was generally a difficult day for Grisha; he worked for 18 hours, like a real polar explorer. It's a good scene: a little man on top of the world, and he's the ruler of the world in a good way.

"We've made great movies before, and we should do them again."

It seemed to me, or are you still a little idealizing a country called the Soviet Union?

I did not set myself such a task. I wanted to show how I saw this country and what the people with whom I lived were like when I left to work in the North. When I arrived in Tiksi in 1980, there was such a commune there, a community of young people, amazingly educated, intellectuals, lovers of literature, singing, and music. These were graduates of Leningrad and Moscow universities, and I got there from Odessa. It was a wonderful time. Real work: the pilots have arrived, the ice reconnaissance has arrived, the geologists have arrived, and the border guards have arrived. Money was just a consequence of our work, not the goal. And maybe that’s why until now everything that was discovered there provides the country, for example, with natural resources.

But in your film, one hero shoots another because of money.

It's not about money, it's about gold. This moment is not in the book, and it will still cause controversy, but I really wanted to show the destructive, irrational influence of gold on a person. Veterans who were engaged in gold prospecting told me what magical effect this metal has on people.

That is, the ending is not connected with the original source?

He's quite free-spirited. The novel ends with a very short epilogue. There is no action; it seems to suggest further development. Perhaps Kuvaev did not have time to say anything else. But we used quite a lot of his personal notes, letters, notes, his unfinished things - for example, the novel “Rules of Escape”, where he scattered a lot of philosophical grains. I wanted to pay tribute to Kuvaev, because the stories that I contributed to my film appear in his dialogues and letters.

Is the plot of the film very different from the novel? In my opinion, some of your characters turned out to be very modern.

We changed something, for example, two Kuvaev characters became the basis for the image of Mongolov (the hero of Yegor Beroev). Or, for example, Sergushova, the heroine of Kutepova, does not occupy such a place in Kuvaev. We have given the woman the power to tell the story. I love these characters very much, and it seemed to me that they should be like that, different.

Yes, but almost all the characters in the film, placed in the harsh conditions of the North, turned out to be heroes. It seems to me that you greatly idealize both the country and the people.

There is always a certain proportion of people in society who are ready to live such a life and are not ready to give it up for any benefits.

And now there are such people?

Yes, I know them. Active geologists, for example. They have a dream, and this dream has not yet dried up, has not been exhausted, it warms them up, drags them forward. They still love their lives and their jobs. This is such a big exception.

Do you hope that this will cease to be an exception and there will be more heroes? But in the movies everything always looks tempting, but in life it’s grey, gloomy, cold.

Well, we lived there. We were all very cold, sometimes we didn’t sleep for days. These were the most difficult conditions, but personal observation tells me that most people who worked on our film expedition remember and will remember it as one of the best events of their lives.

I think the authorities will like your film, because they can build a certain ideology on it.

It seems to me that there is an ideology of the state that exists at the moment. And there is an ideology of an individual person - this is his worldview. We live today in a world in which this ideology does not exist. We don't even have an understanding of our own, personal responsibility for what happens around us. The man is left in a space in which it is very difficult for him to navigate. They blindfolded him, spun him around and said: well, now live! And he is looking for at least some sound, some kind of landmark, because there is nothing inside. He doesn’t have this faith that I can take a step and won’t stumble. And the heroes of the film have such strength, they can walk along ridges, across rivers with their eyes closed and with their gaze penetrate into the depths of the earth. And this is an amazing condition!

What does it mean to serve the state? Do we serve the state today, or individual people who are in power, or the state as such? Russia - what is this with us? To what period of time is this concept limited for me or for you? Where are the people who served this state outside of any ideological parameters, but left a colossal mark on the history of mankind? In literature, in art, in geography? We finished working on “Territory” late at night, sat at Mosfilm, and the Finnish composer Tuomas Kantelinen, who worked on the film, said: “Alexander, I like our cinema so much. You know, you and I have created a Russian patriotic cinema. But not propaganda, there is no propaganda here, but good patriotism. I'm so glad about it!" I was very happy with his assessment, because the man came from another world, and he understood that you can talk about Russia, that there is no shame in it, you can show it to people, and, probably, this will help us communicate in some way. with a friend. Well, we have no other choice - we can’t live on knives all the time. We probably have to demonstrate our strength, but the strength is not so much physical superiority, but the strength of the spirit, the strength of will, the strength of thought, the strength of our beauty.

So you are against “depressive” movies? The one that says that life is hopeless, meaningless, and Russia is a cruel and lawless country?

We have a lot of such films. It seems to me that there is a competition going on: who will show even more depressingly how to turn a person into a beast and explain that this is some kind of mistake of God? I have absolutely no objection to such a movie. But then there must be another direction, within which we are still trying to discern a reflection of God in man. After all, a person cannot live on hatred alone, envy alone. Still, we believe that in our lives we will meet people who will be close to us, to whom we cannot turn our backs and who will not betray us in difficult moments of life. And if we believe, it means we need to make a movie about it too.

There is a certain foundation, a platform on which civilization rests. I really love Alexei Losev and his wonderful work “Dialectics of Myth,” for which he later suffered all his life. One of the main conclusions he makes for me is: a people who stop creating myths is doomed to defeat, collapse and destruction.

But by creating myths, you can go into a parallel reality and break away from life.

Real life is made by real people. If a person believes that he can live like this here, then he will live like this. So Egor Beroev arrives at the site, and we tell him: prepare for two or three days, then shoot. The next day I pass by his tent and see that he has put pegs around it, woven the fence, cleaned everything, organized some kind of table and is sitting drinking tea in the evening. A person has created a certain level of comfort for himself, because he has an understanding inside that a person should live like a person. In a beautiful place, which can become beautiful if he comes there. And everyone suddenly looked and said: “It’s beautiful, let’s do it too.” And a transformation began in our camp. That's how it is in the rest of life. There are people, artists, writers, directors, who carry impulses, and how an ordinary person will live depends on these impulses. Today, this system of relationships with authority, with heroes, is rapidly collapsing. We repeat all the time: everything is bad with us, there are no heroes, we are collapsing. And who is to blame for this? State? Or are we all together?

But the authorities don’t really need heroes because they are difficult to manipulate.

There are fake heroes and there are real ones. If you create a system for producing heroes, you can create a lot of them. But, faced with real circumstances, at some point they begin to crumble. In order not to fall apart, literature exists first of all - it examines the hero, chooses him, forces him to go through everything and remain a hero. This is why there is theatrical dramaturgy, and this is why cinema exists. One friend told me that in Vladivostok the academic theater staged a play based on Valentin Pikul’s novel “Cruisers” - about how a Russian cruiser, surrounded by the Japanese, does not surrender and goes under water with its flag raised. And suddenly - some incredible success, tickets were sold out until spring. And some regional leader came to the performance. “He’s covered in armor,” a friend tells me, “and then suddenly at the end of the performance he’s crying.” This means that someone found a chink in the armor through which they lightly pricked him in the heart and said: “Listen, you were born to be like these heroes.” I have a feeling that we are on the threshold when amazing opportunities open up for creative people - you just have to imagine the person as a person. There is “Spring on Zarechnaya Street” and there is “July Rain” - different films made at the same time, but in this film there are people who somehow influenced us. We've made great movies before, and we should do them again.

“There is no propaganda here, but good patriotism” – Power – Kommersant