Alexander Veledinsky: “The world is unfair – that’s the problem”

Alexander Veledinsky was among those who made the serial revolution at the turn of the 1990–2000s. He is the screenwriter of “The Brigade” and the director of “The Law,” one of the first Russian series about a serial killer. Later, Veledinsky would also direct one of the most striking films of the 2010s – the tragicomedy “The Geographer Drank His Globe Away” (2013) based on the novel by Alexei Ivanov. This film remains the most successful winner of Kinotavr at the box office (according to the Film Distributor’s Bulletin, the film collected 143 million rubles in Russia and the CIS).

Veledinsky’s new film “1993” (in theaters on September 28) is based on the novel of the same name by Sergei Shargunov. And this is again a tragicomedy – the story of a family trying to find its place in the turbulent 1990s. Bryantsev (played by Evgeny Tsyganov, star of “The Thaw” and “Peter FM”) was a physicist, and now a plumber. His wife Lena (Ekaterina Vilkova from “The Last Hero”), a girl from an intelligent family, is trying to start a business. At least some. Finally, daughter Tanya (Anna Tsvetkova’s first big role) got involved with a young bandit. But everything fades into the background when, on September 21, 1993, President Boris Yeltsin tries to dissolve the Supreme Council and Bryantsev, unexpectedly for himself, finds himself at the epicenter of history.

In an interview with Vedomosti, the director talks about why he often takes on film adaptations – and never films verbatim, how space penetrated into “1993”, which makes the hero Tsyganov similar to the character of Konstantin Khabensky from “The Geographer…”, and also talks about how the serial revolution of the 2000s differs from the streaming boom.