About slaves and masters: a new comedy film revealed the truth about Russia

It happens that film ratings also provide important information about the political situation in the country. And now, perhaps, is precisely such a moment. The leader of Russian film distribution today is the film “Slave-2”. On the face of it, it’s a light-hearted comedy. However, the picture of the country painted by this film is, in some places, perhaps even more reliable than the news releases on federal channels.

According to the latest data, “Slave-2” has already collected 3.3 billion rubles at the box office. Your humble servant also contributed his contribution, his grain of sand, to this grandiose golden mountain. And I didn’t regret it at all. For it has been a long time since I have seen such truth of life on the silver screen. Not to mention the television screen.

“The main character of the sequel to the comedy blockbuster is Grisha, a former major who played the role of a serf from the century before last, which changed him for the better,” says the Kinoafisha website. “After traveling to the “past,” he is sensitive to any injustice and, of course, “Can’t ignore the chaos that the impudent and spoiled Katya is creating. It’s not surprising that the major girl soon finds herself in a different time and in a different social status.”

No, in principle, everything is correct. But a number of essential, key details are missing. And we, of course, will make up for them. There is, however, a certain risk that citizens who have not seen the film will perceive this as a spoiler. But first of all, risk is a noble cause. Secondly, the creators of “Slave-2” and film distributors have already made decent money. And thirdly, who knows: perhaps this, on the contrary, will increase the number of viewers.

So, Katya (actress Aglaya Tarasova) is not just arrogant and spoiled. She is a typical representative of the modern Russian elite, its younger generation. Katya doesn’t work anywhere, but she lives in grand style. Partying – as the hero of another famous film would put it, “fun, cheerfully, good-naturedly, with all sorts of harmless antics.” He vacations at expensive resorts, and flies exclusively in business class. He dresses beautifully, eats well, drives a nice, expensive car… In short, everything, as they say, is as we like it. More precisely – how they love.

On top of everything, the girl is completely cut off from her roots: completely indifferent to her Motherland. Much more than her homeland, she likes France. She even regrets in one episode that Napoleon did not conquer Russia. By the way, appreciate the relevance of the topic: drinking parties are not “naked”, true, but no less ugly, and even blatant unpatriotism. The film hit the box office not only in a financial sense.

But let’s return to the film and its characters. The sources of Katya’s wealth, although not directly named, are obvious: she is the daughter of a large, high-ranking official. And judging by the fact that her daughter does not count her money, the state lady clearly lives on more than one salary and is clearly abusing her official position. And one abuse – not financial, but apparently not without money – is described in detail in the film.

Katya eventually finished with the revelry: being drunk, she stole a police boat – the action takes place in St. Petersburg – and crashed into the veranda of a restaurant on the embankment, miraculously not killing anyone. The girl is sentenced to two years in prison. But the almighty mother, of course, excuses her daughter. Katya comes to the colony where she is supposed to serve her sentence only to film for television.

And here the most interesting thing begins: Grisha (Milos Bikovich) takes on the task of re-educating Katya. Re-education is carried out by the same methods that in the previous film Grisha himself is returned to the true path, that is, by immersion in the “past”. In this case, even a specific year is named – 1812. This is in order to cure Katya not only of selfishness and majorism, but also of cosmopolitanism. They were hit by the Patriotic War because of their dislike for the Fatherland.

We will not reveal all the details of this therapy, otherwise it will really be uninteresting to watch. Let’s just say that the treatment was successful: Katya found not only good manners, but also her homeland.

Of course, this part of the tape looks, to put it mildly, implausible. In the sense that for the sake of re-educating Katya, who is unfamiliar to them, Grisha and his oligarch dad are putting on such a performance that where is film director Bondarchuk Sr. with his “War and Peace”.

The game is clearly not worth the candle; there are other ways of education – cheaper and no less effective. However, if you think about it, this also has its own homespun truth: it happens that our oligarchs spend money on much crazier projects.

It is also impossible not to note the accurately noticed – wittingly or unwittingly – similarity between social relations in Russia at the beginning of the 19th and 21st centuries. Morals have, of course, softened somewhat over the past 200 years, but the essence has remained the same: there are slaves, and there are gentlemen, masters of life.

Well, the ending is generally impeccable: the newly minted patriot Katya again cuts through the waters of Northern Venice on a boat, but this time sober as glass and not alone, but in an embrace with her savior Grisha. And her mother at this time is on a romantic and business date with the creator of the reality show that impressed her, the eccentric psychologist Leva (played by Ivan Okhlobystin): Leva asks the official for money for new projects, and she seems ready to give…

I’m sorry, what? Would you like a different ending? So that the reformed majora goes to a colony to serve out her sentence, and her corrupt supermom goes to prison? But have mercy, citizens: this definitely doesn’t happen here. It is fantastic.