Artdokfest. May I just be

Film about the driver of the bus and a parodist who are trying to create a family

In Moscow and St. Petersburg, in December 2015, the Artdokfest documentary festival will be held. Some films from the competitive program will be shown in October in Riga. For ten weeks that remained before the start of the filmmaker in Russia, Medusa will show trailers 21 films from the competition, as well as fifteen paintings from parallel programs - they will be chosen by the President of the festival Vitaliy Mansky. In addition, the documentary director himself will tell about each film. Trailers will go out on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. The first picture that Medusa represents is the film directed by Matvey Troshinkin "Can I just be?" Attention: in the video, obscene vocabulary sounds.

Vitaly Mansky

Director, President of the Festival "Artdokfest"

When I watch the film and make a decision, whether I will vote for it as a film of a competitive program, I am interested in three main components. The first is necessarily a condition-so that the film really excites me, so that he would agile me, outraged him not to leave me indifferent. The second is so that it is made very non -banally by profession, so that as much as possible to be close to the art of documentary cinema. And the third is that I vote for the film to whom I personally, being the chairman of the jury, gave the Grand Prix. My point of view that the competition should only have paintings that have a chance to get a Grand Prix.

Sometimes there are very strong films, vivid, maybe even perfect, but I feel that this picture has no chance of the main prize-and then I will definitely vote for it to be on Artdokfest, but in some kind of extra-curric program.

“Artdokfest” from many festivals differs in that we present only three prizes - at other festivals there are also prizes “from the newspaper”, “from criticism” and so on. We do not have this, so we have a very hard work of the jury and very tough competition. In the last days, when the jury begins to endure his verdict, my heart is simply pounding, because I sincerely worry about each film.

We have a difficult competition - it should be either a Russian picture shot in any language of the world, or foreign, shot in Russian. Complex regulations, but it allows us to collect a strong documentary program. By the way, filmmakers living outside of Russia look at it more calmly, less engaged, maybe this is a more sober, free look.

And yet, of course, I cannot but note one circumstance. So it turns out that the worse the situation in Russia and in the world, the brighter the program and the higher the interest in our films. The more disgusting the television channels represent the country and the world, the more willingly the audience rises and goes to the December frosty evening to the horizon cinema, pays money for a ticket and watches documentary cinema. The professional audience "Artdokfest" is approximately 5% of the common audience, that is, people come to us for whom it is vital to get acquainted with other points of view.

The trend is such a thing whose existence is every artist, including me, will dispute. He knows that his individual idea is unique and came to him directly from space. But when you are watching such a volume, you can see that, for example, now in Russian cinema there is a tendency to disappoint, confusion and fear. Considering that the film has been being made for about a year, today, at this point, we are watching the paintings that were conceived in 2014 - there is fear and confusion, the desire to get away from directly posed questions.

I even feel some kind of planned Renaissance of a poetic documentary cinema, which dominated in the 60-70s in the Soviet Union, when there were “locks in the sand”, “look at the face”, “ten minutes older”. This is a look at the lyrical side of life, some philosophical artistic generalizations that gave birth, by the way, a great movie. But we do not know a single picture of the Soviet period about people who emigrated from the country, there were no films, for example, about Sakharov or Solzhenitsyn - no one even thought of making such a movie. All the more valuable films that we have found and show now. And I would like to introduce them to you.

Matvey Troshinkin's film with the difficult name "Can I just be?" - This is a direct quote from the dialogue of the heroes of the film, which sounds closer to the end of the picture. Frankly, this scene made an impression on me, similar to the effect of the first viewing of the “Nights of Kabiria” , when Juliet Mazin is deceived, crying.

This is the story of two single people whom life pushed, united in a married couple living in aggressive Moscow. One - a young man who dreams of an artist’s career is forced to speak with parodies on the corporate parties of the cheapest damage and portray his idols - not even idols, but those whom he would like to be. According to the film, it is clear that he would like to be a star, a star-Kirkorov star, a bacon-star, a star-a-war Serduchka. But corporate parties cannot offer a sufficient price for him - for example, he performs in the Kashchenko hospital.

His partner - it would seem, who could have been a partner with a novice star? - He found in the public, this is the driver of the Moscow bus. Two different, in some ways infringed and therefore touching souls, united either for a moment or for life, want to and try to build their infinitely long being, because they are now very young. And one says to another: "Can I just be?"

This is a very touching movie. Perhaps it will say less tolerant audience than others; We do not invite those who offer to “burn in furnaces”; But those who have questions, who just have a relationship, I would invite you to watch this film-maybe they will find something in it for their personal understanding.

PS Festival "Artdokfest" will be held in Moscow and St. Petersburg December 8-16, 2015. Eight films from the competitive program will be shown in Riga on October 15-25 as part of the Riga International Film Festival.

All the trailers of films from ArtdoxFest can be seen here .