A graduate of the Kabardino-Balkarian workshop of Sokurov made a film in his homeland

Three paintings by Sokurov’s students participated in the program at once, including Malika Musayeva’s “The Cage is Looking for a Bird”. With her, Oleg Khamokov studied at the now famous Sokurov workshop at the Kabardino-Balkarian University in Nalchik. And the master has such a routine that everyone helps each other, takes part in the filming of other students. His recent graduate Nikita Dobrynin, already from his course at the St. Petersburg University of Cinema and Television, presented in Khanty-Mansiysk a documentary film about the leaders, a small people deprived of their territory. When asked by MK whether he had known Oleg Khamokov before, he replied that he had worked for him on the set of the film Knots.

Every time an old photograph from the Cannes Film Festival came across, where Sokurov’s students were sitting at the same table at the reception of the Russian Pavilion, thoughts arose about how their fate had turned out. There are Kira Kovalenko and Kantemir Balagov, who could not even imagine that they would soon become winners of the Cannes Film Festival. We know about films by Vladimir Bitokov and Alexander Zolotukhin that participated in the Venice and Berlin festivals. In February, Malika Musaeva presented her debut “The Cage Is Looking for a Bird” at the Berlinale. There was also another young director in the photograph, whose fate was unknown. And so he himself appeared on the “Spirit of Fire”. Before meeting with Sokurov, Oleg Khamokov graduated from the theater department of the North Caucasus Institute of Arts. Prior to his feature-length debut, Knots made several short films. He is one of the few who remained in Nalchik. Fate scattered others, and they live in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Hamburg and Los Angeles.

The heroes of “Knots” are an adult and brutal trucker Byrd and his tender 17-year-old wife Dina. There is no love, they came together due to various circumstances and now they are building the largest house in the village together. For Byrd, this is a symbol of superiority over fellow villagers. Gradually, the house becomes an impregnable fortress.

Dina was played by a graduate of the Moscow Art Theater School Svetlana Mamresheva, who played in the Moscow Art Theater. Chekhov and in the Seventh Studio. She starred with Andrei Eshpay in the film “Terrible”, where she played the daughter of the Kabardian prince Temryuk and the second wife of Ivan the Terrible, Maria Temryukovna. She worked in “Dovlatov” with Alexei German Jr., in “Optimists” by Alexei Popogrebsky. The main character was played by Robert Saralp with twenty years of clown experience, familiar to many from the Snow Show by Slava Polunin. He is a graduate of the Theater School. Shchukin and directing courses at Goskino, where Alexander Mitta was his master. He didn’t work much in film.

We talked with Oleg Khamokov after the premiere of his film “Knots”.

— Are you one of the few from your course who stayed in Nalchik? An interesting city, not the way one can imagine it, bright in a European way and at the same time with a special national flavor …

— I live in Nalchik and work in the Kabardinka State Academic Dance Ensemble. Probably not quite in profile. I try to promote my ideas, I do everything in order to maintain the culture. I write scripts. For me, Nalchik is a source of inspiration.

– Many of your fellow students have already shot their first and second films. How can you explain why you were so late with your debut?

— I started writing the script immediately after graduation, like all my classmates. At first I worked on one script, but it did not suit the producer, they made another version. Long, long discussions followed. Refinement has begun. All this took about a year. We did not agree on some dramatic issue, and I said that it was better not to shoot than to shoot something that I would not want to. He immediately offered a second script, which screenwriter Zarina Kanukova began to write ahead of time. In the same way, we first worked on the Caucasian version, which was eventually implemented. You saw him in Khanty-Mansiysk. We remade it for German reality, and at the core was a conflict between a German and a migrant from the Middle East, whom he married. The plot is the same, but with a European social flair.

“Again, it took some time. In general, the work lasted five years, while we brought it to mind, and circumstances made it possible to implement it. At every stage, everything that could potentially happen to this film has happened. Even at the festival, to say it not very seriously, the concert of Vyacheslav Butusov coincided with my screening, where many rushed, which, probably, I would have done if it were not for the premiere of my film. But it’s not the number of spectators, but the reception. I left satisfied with my show. How the fate of the film will turn out is unknown. I’m afraid to even guess. You attended the first show with the audience. Prior to that, its premiere took place in China at the Hainan Festival. I myself have not been there.

How and where was your picture filmed?

The path of the film is tortuous. Half a month before the date on which it was planned to start filming in Germany, a pandemic began. For a year and a half we worked on the “German” script, in the end, at my request, we returned to where we started. There was no moral strength left. Filmed for 28 days in the village of Chegem II near Nalchik, where a house under construction was temporarily expropriated, and in St. Petersburg – scenes inside the house.

– Perhaps, except for Vladimir Bitokov, who made the male painting “Deep Rivers”, in all other works of your course, a young woman is in the center?

“I don’t think my film has a young woman at the center. My heroes are equal. Another question is that the well-established concept of the festival “women’s” cinema in the world often deceives the viewer. They immediately try to insert any work into the existing tracing paper, but I absolutely do not accept this. In my film, each character has their own conflict. It cannot be otherwise. They tied many “knots” and are not inferior to one another. So, what happened is inevitable.

– You talk interestingly about the change in the concept of “matriarchy” in the modern world. What is this theory?

– This is my personal concept, which appeared as a result of personal observations, in the context of what is happening in the world, and from the point of view of my Adyghe culture. I grew up in a Kabardian village on Kabardian fairy tales, which have become my reference book. I admired their heroes, looked up to them. Having moved to a big city in Kabardino-Balkaria, I felt a certain dissonance. These were not the characters I met in fairy tales. He began to comprehend the situation and came to the conclusion that the modern world has swept aside all humanistic civilizational principles and began to act according to only “female” psychophysics. React like a woman to any problems, achieve goals like her.

Having adopted women’s skills, men, by virtue of their physical strength, pushed women themselves into the background and began to rule the world in “female” ways. This is very bad from a civilizational point of view, at least it will have a logical outcome. The man is the epitome of freedom. He should give it not only to himself, but also to his children, his wife. A woman, in my opinion, is not free from nature, even in terms of the structure of her body. She is the personification of life, for the sake of preserving and continuing which she can give up any other considerations. But these two substances must always be together and complement each other. They are equal in their energies. And one does not exist without the other.

— There are many good theater artists in Nalchik, but you were looking for your heroes in Moscow.

— Of course, we have enough professional actors in Nalchik. We worked with them when we studied, filmed term papers. We have several theaters, and I never cease to admire the people who work there. But there is no film industry as such. For us, it is a wonder. And there are few people adapted in it, even among professional actors. This requires an environment that does not yet exist. Non-professional actors also acted in episodic roles, but mostly we invited professionals from theaters. In Moscow, they were looking for those who come from Kabardino-Balkaria. We follow talented people who manage to break out of the provincial environment and succeed. We choose them for their talent.

– The lead actress Svetlana Mamresheva worked at the Moscow Art Theater. Chekhov, “Gogol-center”, then went to Germany. What is she doing now?

– I do not know for sure. I read somewhere that he plays in the theater. She is also a great singer, performs baroque music. My great pain is connected with the fact that such a talented and versatile person as she, for ten years in Moscow, has not become fully in demand. If such actors do not get serious roles, then what about the rest?

– Robert Saralp is definitely lucky. After many years of participating in the Snow Show, he got a very different role.

– He is a very talented person. Which one of us is lucky is the big question. Of course, we are lucky to have each other. We got the opportunity to work on one project and did everything we could at this stage. Of course, I see all my flaws, but this is also an integral part of the process.

– You received a serious directing education. Is there any possibility of further work?

— I have been waiting for this premiere for so long, I dreamed so much about getting to this kind of festival in order to meet people, to get them interested in my projects. I have three scripts in the works now, one is ready. I think that there will always be a person to whom your idea will be close. For me, the greatest value of the festival is this. This is a platform where you can meet good, smart, decent people, professionals in their field. I was happy to see my film in the hall with the audience watching it incessantly. I followed literally every single one of them. For me, this is the very implementation that I aspire to. It is important that my film becomes not only mine, but also the audience. A five-six-year wait is extremely painful.

– Is there anyone from your workshop who has not yet made a debut film?

There are still two or three people. I hope that they still squeeze their pictures. Many talented directors simply can’t get to the very people who would love their ideas. This happens regardless of talent. We must rush forward, walk, ask, offer ourselves. You have to move, since you took on such a difficult task. I sincerely, with all my heart, want to be a director. To all the exhortations of people who say that nothing will work out, why waste time in vain, I have a simple answer: “It will work out.” I have many projects, but I need to find the very producer who will understand the ideas that I propose.

Do you keep in touch with your classmates?

We communicate, we talk almost every day. When the guys come to Nalchik, we immediately get together. We are glad to each other, we ask about successes. In the end, this is what our master wanted, so that we would be like one family, like brothers and sisters. He told us about this more than once, so that we would understand that there is no one but us, each other, and most likely will not be.