The series "Fandorin. Azazel ”at Kinopoisk: Detective Erast Fandorin is investigating the case in alternative modern Russia, where there was no 1917 revolution

It turns out ... well, judge for yourself

Two episodes of the series Fandorin have already been released at Kinopoisk. Azazel ” - film adaptation of the first novel by Boris Akunin about the detective Erast Petrovich Fandorin. The film version differs from the literary original in that all its events are, as it were, transferred to modern Russia. However, this is an alternative reality: there was no revolution of 1917, the Russian monarchy was able to survive the 20th century (the creators were clearly inspired by Sherlock with Benedict Cumberbatch - there the detective was also settled in modern London). It turned out not bad, but the idea of ​​the “charming Russian Empire” looks inappropriate in the current conditions.

Attention! In this text there are spoilers to the first two episodes of the series “Fandorin. Azazel. "

The thin young man in the cadet - more precisely, very similar to the cadet - form and cap sits in a river ship on the Neva. The glare, reflected by the river, play on his thoughtful face. A voice from the reproduct announces: “The Station“ White Guard ”. The next station is “Olga Velikaya Avenue”. ” The camera drives away to show how strict skyscrapers are lifted over the surface of the river.

This is Russia of alternative reality: it did not have the October Revolution of 1917, the Bolsheviks did not come to power, and the imperial family survived. In the country, the monarchy is still in the country, spelling in 1918 has not been reformed, and men wear the names of Xaveri Feofilaktovich or Erast Petrovich. That is what the name is the young man in the cap - Erast Fandorin.

January 19 the series “Fandorin. Azazel ”based on the novel by the writer Boris Akunin, he started on the Kinopoisk platform. In the first season, eight episodes are declared - according to the episode once a week.

The scriptwriters Sergei and Nikita Popova and director Nurbek Uul Egen (Sherlock in Russia, Major-4) were placed in a fictional time-space where modernity and an anachronism were placed. The very young and still not stuttering Erast Petrovich travels on the Russian Analog “Vespa”, looking for suspects from the tablet in the social network “Portrait” and lives next to the western high-speed diameter in the cayut room stuffed with electronics.

Why is Fandorin stuttering

In the final of the first novel by Boris Akunin, Azazel from the explosion, the bride of Fandorin dies, the hero himself miraculously alive. After the explosion, he begins to stutter and his whiskey turns gray.

The young fandorin plays a graduate of chips , actor of the Maly Theater Vladislav Tiron. This is the main great luck of the series: Erast Petrovich performed by Tyron is a pretty geek, almost Shurik from the Operation “Y”; A shy, but persistent character. His fandorin is the most lively and fragile of all the screen incarnations of the famous detective, and after all Ilya Noskov (Azazel, 2002), Oleg Menshikov (“Statsky Advisor”, 2005), Yegor Beroev (Turkish Gambit, 2005) and even Vladimir Zelensky (in the comedy Musical Music, “like Cossacks ...” with the participation of Philippe Kirkorova, now supporting Russian military aggression in Ukraine).

Nurbek Egen does not need to prove that he knows how to create exciting series: this was “Sherlock in Russia” - and the first episodes of Fandorin turned out to be the same. The suicide of the orphan and the techno -realistic Peter Kokorin (in the original by Akunin - the rich heir) in the summer garden and the accident in the walking boat are interconnected. But what a criminal trace unites them and how the bohemian singer Amalia (Milena Radulovich), the favorite of Emperor Nicholas III (Maxim Matveev), is to be clarified in the following episodes.

Simultaneously with the investigation in the life of Erast Petrovich, a love interest appears-Lisa von Evert-Kolokolkoltseva (Mila Ershova), the daughter of a high-ranking official, living in a mansion, not inferior in scale to the Russian Museum. All stitches connecting important secrets are already outlined, and an ominous name - Azazel sounds from the screen.

As a film adaptation of the action -packed retro -detective “Fandorin. Azazel ”looks excellent, even an invented alternative reality does not interfere with him. Composing a new version of Fandorin, the creators of the series clearly kept Stephen Moffat and Mark Gattis with Benedict Cumberbatch in the Sherlock’s mind, whose authors also moved to modernity. Like the British detector, the young Fandorin is also emotional and impulsive - and the scene in which he is met by a completely naked witness in the case (Ekaterina Barnabas), and completely copies the scene of the meeting of Sherlock and Irene Adler .

In general, even an emperor with a false forehead does not spoil the impression of Fandorin: so that actor Maxim Matveev (“Trigger”, “Sherlock in Russia”) resembles a monarch from the Romanovs' House, with the help of make -up, he “grew up” his head and made a hairstyle in the style of Alexander I.

The worse is that the series tells about the empire (and this is one of the most relevant topics in the world), but there is no reflection of imperial, judging by the first episodes. In addition, Russia with the emperor and social network “Portrait” in Fandorin is almost no different from Russia from other series - those where there is president and Instagram. This fictitious monarchy is white, Slavic, rich and heteronormative. According to the authors, it turns out that the country, passing the creation of a den of the Chekists on Lubyanka and Gulag, was at the same point as Russia with the Chekists and Gulag.

Further - more. The king is kind, the boyars are bad. Everything is ambiguous. Everywhere provocations. And they stand behind them (if the creators remain faithful to the plot of Akunin himself) Anglo -Saxons. So it suddenly turns out that the entertainment series “Fandorin” - with excellent actors, a cheerful pace and neatly placed by cliffhangers - as a result, almost ignores the real political context (and suggests doing the same to the viewer).

What about Akunin with the Anglo -Saxons?

In Akunin’s novel, Azazel to destroy the empire and build a fair society with the help of explosives, the Englishwoman Lady Esther wants. She is the organizer of the Secret Azazel Society.

However, in some places the reality of the unacceptable 2023 nevertheless peels out from under the blue lining of the uniforms invented by Russia. In the Kingdom of the Romanovs there are two camps: the uncle of the emperor, the commander in chief of the army, Mikhail Romanov (Igor Chernievich), really wants to bring troops somewhere and “pacify someone”; Prime Minister Orlov (Evgeny Podchkin), on the contrary, avoids conflicts and has already been awarded the Order of Alexander III for peacekeeping activities. Prime Minister Orlov elusively resembles young Sergei Kiriyenko , Uncle Romanov is Nikolai Patrushev , and Fandorin himself looks like the opposition policy Ilya Yashin, who is now sitting in prison.

A certain country of the Middle East (Syria?) Asks for help from Russia - and warlike Mikhail Romanov demands to introduce troops under the guise of a “peacekeeping” mission. Moderate Prime Minister Orlov insists on the humanitarian mission. The soft emperor (are in alternative reality and such) does not want war and blood, agrees with the prime minister. But the troops are still being introduced-and now in the next frame in the tablets and phones of the subjects of the empire there are shots of bombing and destruction in an unnamed country.

A group of Performansist artists reacts to this-it seems like Pussy Riot, although the collective is at the head of the team, reminiscent of Peter Pavlensky-they fill the reservoirs of Peterhof fountains with red paint, which is opened by Nicholas III. At a concert, the emperor from the hall shout: "Killer!" The hero of Maxim Matveev with drops of “blood” on his forehead is amazed and causes the commander in chief on the carpet. He denies involvement in shelling in the Middle East: provocation, everything is adjusted.

Akunin himself in the series appears only a line in the credits. So far, he has not commented on a new adaptation, but he announced on Facebook that he wrote a new novel about the adventures of Fandorin and his assistant, the Japanese Masa, and now gives him "to lie down before the publication."

The Fandorin cycle began in 1998 with the novel Azazel. In 1999, when Putin took office as the acting President of Russia, everyone already read Akunin and waited for new books. Fandorin and his retromir became a literary placebo for readers created by Japanese philologist Grigory Chkartishvili: it was a game of classical literature, but without moralizing.

And it was an attempt to escape from reality to a pleasant (and therefore never existing) long -standing past. What if the Soviet world was not - and there was no what followed him? How good it would be to live in the Universe of the Statsky Advisers, court ladies and Xavori Feofilaktovich ... The source itself offers the reader escapism, but the authors of the series even more increase the distance between fantasy and reality-and for some reason transfer this fairy tale in 2023. However, it is not possible to believe in it right now.

Irina Karpova