Russian Resurrection Film Festival: Preview

For as long as Nicholas Maksymow can remember there’s been a festival of Russian films in Australia. Well before he became the festival director for the current incarnation (a position he’s held for nine years), Maksymow was a regular punter for the yearly celebration of Soviet cinema, once hosted at Sydney’s much loved and long-gone Mandolin Theatre.

The Russian cinema tradition is as old as film itself and its innovations, key players, and institutions are legends. The profound impact and influence on world cinema and its makers over the last 100 years of, say, Mosfilm, Eisenstein, and Vertov, is deep and vast.

One of the key aims of the festival, says Maksymow, is to remind audiences of that tradition while curating a program of the very best of recent Russian national cinema. (All titles are native, he says, since its part of the selection process.)

The festival’s brand reflects these philosophical and curatorial ambitions: “After the Soviet Union collapsed, the Soviet cinema collapsed too,” he says. “The films of the immediate post-Soviet era were of poor quality; they were making about 30 a year. Then in 1998, the government set up a fund… and when we started the festival, Russian film was resurrecting itself.” Today, Maksymow says, the modern Russian film industry produces between “70-80 films a year, with budgets ranging from very low, so called, micro budgets, to big budget mainstream films equivalent to $20m US.”

This year, Maksymow and his colleagues have programmed 25 films. There are two retrospectives: one to commemorate the centenary of Russia’s victory in the war of 1812, and the other dedicated to playwright and author Anton Chekov.

In selecting the new films, amongst them homeland box office hits like Vysotskiy, Thank God I’m Alive (pictured), a critically acclaimed ‘70s-set bio-pic about singer-songwriter Vladimir Vysotskiy, Maksymow and the RRFF team aimed to indicate the diversity, scope and range of recent Russian cinema. This, he says, is in contrast with international programmers who favour so-called ‘difficult’ (but none the less rewarding) art-house pictures like Twilight Portrait (which screened at this year’s Sydney Film Festival). “That film, and there are recently quite a few others like it, tend to portray Russia and in particular [modern] Moscow as bleak and dark… it is like the filmmakers and [certain critics] are suggesting that the more grim and challenging, and the more shocking, the better [the film] is.”

But, he says, audiences don’t want to see this style and treatment “all the time”.And besides, for Maksymow, this grim sensibility is “exaggerated” and not quite true. Still, this year’s program has its, in his word, “bleak” moments: There Once Lived a Simple Woman, which he says is “tough art house” fare. An historical drama about a peasant woman living through the post-revolution age, its stark and critical portrait of life in Soviet Russia, has become, unsurprisingly, a major trope in the national cinema.

By contrast, this year’s program also features comedies like Gromozeka, a funny/sad story about a reunion of three high school pals, and the excellent Two Days, a witty, bright and intelligent piece about a stubborn bureaucrat whose second nature is political expediency and his object of desire, an equally intractable cultural caretaker. Their quarrelsome screwball love affair is spiked with a satirical edge. Then there are adventure ‘blockbusters’ like Spy, and the spectacular and controversial August 8th, which is set during the ‘Five Day War’ of 2008 in the Caucuses and combines elements of sitcom divorce farces with intense and very violent war action. Georgia and the Ukraine have already ‘banned’ it; in Russia it was a big hit, says Maksymow. “It draws its controversy from the Georgian War and it portrays it from a Russian point of view which, for the former Republics, is biased,” he explains, adding, since the film has a decidedly apolitical sensibility. “When [certain former States] made the decision to ban, they had not probably seen it!”


Director’s Short List of Festival Highlights

Spy
(Dir. Alexey Andrianov, 2012)
Opening Night Film in Sydney.

An imaginative fiction based on the true story about the lead up to Hitler’s attack on Russian, it has Soviet counter-intelligence chasing a Nazi spy. “It’s about a spy summoned by Stalin’s men to determine when Hitler will attack. It’s a big budget mainstream film with a cast – Fyodr Bondarchuk, Danila Kozlovksiy,Vladimir Epifantsev, Viktoria Tolstoganovaare – who are amongst the major figures in Russia film.”

Siberia Mon Amour
(Dir. Slava Ross, 2011)
Set in the majestic and austere beauty of Siberia, this highly esteemed and complex drama about survival has humour and pathos. “It’s a great story about an old man who lives in a deserted village and the relationship with his grandson.”

Yolki 2 (2011)
(Dirs. Dmitry Kiselev, Alexander Baranov, Alexander Kott, Timur Bekmambetov)
An omnibus film set during New Year’s Eve, this sequel to 2010’s Six Degrees of Celebration combines a series of romantic interludes directed by six of Russia’s top filmmakers including Night Watch helmer Timur Bekmambetov. Maksymow: “Comedy is the one genre that still struggles in Russian cinema.” But, he says, this box office hit really works brilliantly. The other directors are Dmitry Kiselev, Alexander Baranov and Alexander Kott.

Home
(Dir. Oleg Pogodin, 2011)
This critically acclaimed and award-winning all-star drama mixes tones and genres; it’s funny, intense and full of plot, and combines a domestic setting with gangster and western narratives. “Basically, it’s a story about a dysfunctional family and the conflict involves how they have achieved success in different classes; the eldest son is the in the Mafia. What I liked about is how it [takes you by surprise] – it’s a drama that evolves into a thriller. It won a number of acting prizes at the Nika Awards.”

Retrospectives

The RRFF has programmed a number of films to commemorate the anniversary of 1812 including 1812, a French-Russian co-production made in 1912 and directed by Vasili Goncharov and Kai Hansen, and the 1982 production The Flying Hussar’s Squadron, about the heroic exploits of Denis Davydov during the Napoleonic wars, directed by Nikita Khubov and Stanislav Rostotsky.

But perhaps the one unmissable event in this side-bar is an all too rare screening of the complete War and Peace. Made over a period of five years with a production cost of $US100,000,000 (in adjusted dollars), it utilised the Soviet Army dressed in period perfect uniforms to recreate Napolean’s battles. Still, beyond its pageantry, spectacle and sheer scope, Sergei Bondarchuk’s film has been justly praised as a sensitive, detailed and expert adaptation of Tolstoy’s great novel.

The other major retrospective seeks to celebrate Anton Chekov. The RRFF has programmed The Duel, which is based on a story by Chekov. Made in 1973 and directed by Iosef Heifits, the RRFF notes claim that its style is a fine example of Soviet drama as it was in the early ‘70s.

The major highlight here must be Unfinished Piece for a Player Piano (1977). Directed by Nikita Mikhalkov and based loosely on Chekov’s first play, it’s a witty romantic drama about confused desire and moral responsibility.