"I'm scared"

Documentary blockbuster "On the edge of freedom" about ruffers in Moscow and Kyiv. Artdokfest

Medusa continues to talk about films participating in the competitive program of the Artdox Film Festival (will be held in December 2017 in Moscow, St. Petersburg and Yekaterinburg). This time, the President of the festival Vitaly Mansky represents the documentary blockbuster “On the edge of freedom” Anita Matal Hopland and Jens Lenerke (Russia and Denmark).

Vitaly Mansky

Director-Documentist

The painting "On the edge of freedom" tells about rufers. The film has two parallel stories, two heroes in Moscow, and the other in Kyiv. I did not fully understand why the authors made such a division, because I did not feel any political or even pseudo -political context in the picture. Naturally, any person now, when he sees two heroes from Kyiv and Moscow, is waiting for a completely different story. But this story does not happen. There is no conflict related to the situation of relations between the two countries, the only moment-all the heroes speak Russian. We are simply showed by young people - a girl and a guy who are engaged in Ruffer.

The film provides an opportunity for a bright and very interesting immersion in a completely unknown world. For example, it is difficult for me to understand the motivation of these people, risking a young life every minute, that is, my own life. Although at some point a line arises in the film, which, frankly, was humanly surprising me: someone orders the ruffele to the Rufers, it is not clear for what purpose, but with a fee. And the audience begins to guess that, probably, this reckless flight of the soul sometimes has some kind of monetization.

But from what my head is blown away - this is when the girl with a camera on the head, which we, of course, do not see, climbs into construction cranes and high -rise buildings. And although you are sitting in the hall - but I’m not even sitting in the hall, the program directorate takes the films, watching them on the computer monitor - it begins to nurse you a little. You take your hands for a chair so that, God forbid, you can’t fall off him. But if you look at this picture on the big screen, for example, the October cinema, I’m even afraid to imagine what effect it can produce on the viewer. This is really very spectacular shots.

Usually, when we watch a video with rufers on the Internet, they seem to us depersonalized. Just shots, nobody is behind them, but here are real people with whom you are already familiar, whom you feel and worried about. And this is an unusual effect for a documentary movie: when you begin to worry about the documentary hero just as you would worry about some Harry Potter. In this sense, “on the edge of freedom” is a very unusual picture.

PS About the rest of the films of the competitive program "Artdokfest - 2017" can be found here .