Alexey Serebryakov played a tired investigator

There was a misunderstanding with the “White List”. After the appearance in Novaya Gazeta of an article about teenage death groups, Roman Volobuev, now a director and screenwriter, and once a film critic, wrote a post on social networks that excited Alisa Khazanova. At that moment, she was finishing work on her first film, Shards.

“We realized that the topic worries us. I have two daughters, says Alice. “I am one of the first generation of parents to experience their children spending a lot of time on the Internet. We did not understand that it was possible to live there, and our children already spent a lot of time there. At some point, I realized that there was no dialogue on this topic. Everything is a little out of control, and sometimes scary.

I wanted to make a film and understand what is happening with a whole generation. Then we have already chosen the form of pseudo-detective. The film follows the laws of the genre, but not completely. There is also another cut. We often take the visible for real and cannot understand the essence of what is happening.

The script was written by Roman Volobuev, using familiar surnames. In particular, the producer Nikishov is mentioned, and the few viewers who paid attention to this can only guess why this was done. The producer of “Dyatlov Pass” and “Epidemic” annoyed the screenwriter with something.

I recalled the long-standing showing at the Rotterdam Film Festival of the debut Cuban film, where a famous Russian producer was mentioned. One of the heroines talked about his sexual habits. This was revenge, so revenge. But who could feel it, except for a handful of Russian film critics? So here too.

The White List is about the same group as the Blue Whales. Its participants must complete 12 steps, and the last must lead to a tragic ending. The action takes place in 2015. Who is responsible for the deaths of very young girls, there is no answer in the film.

In a conversation, Alisa Khazanova will say that indifference is to blame. “The system forms a person in such a way that his empathy atrophies, the ability to understand what is happening with the person who is next to you. This is not a purely Russian problem, but a global one. They are afraid to talk about it. This is how a person is arranged that he does not want to talk about terrible things.

Alisa Khazanova mostly addressed her film to her parents. This is a conscious artistic choice. Filming took place in Podolsk, where the authors of the film found the development to be geometrically interesting, creating a way of life in anthills. Big houses dominate the minds of people there.

It is in Podolsk that a role-playing pair of investigators leaves, who will have to figure out the circumstances of the death of girls from quite prosperous families. One investigator – tired, with experience, performed by Alexei Serebryakov. According to Alisa Khazanova, his hero is a little tired of the profession, but finds the strength to remain a decent person and do his duty. Serebryakov outplayed a lot of similar heroes.

The second investigator is young and ready to hit on a pretty girl at any moment, even if she is a defendant in a criminal case. He was played by Vladimir Averyanov. A strange metamorphosis will take place with the young investigator. He will lose everything, although he showed promise, he will turn into a blurry creature (the make-up artists did their best here). However, he will not lose his obsession in investigating the activities of death groups. According to the director, they did not turn to law enforcement agencies for assistance, but there were still consultants on handling weapons.

The film starred young actresses noticed by European festivals: Anastasia Krasovskaya received an acting award in Locarno for Natasha Kudryashova’s Gerda. Victoria Miroshnichenko, thanks to Kantemir Balagov’s “Dylda”, became a nominee for the European Film Academy.

Anton Eliseev in his feature debut “Russian Dreams” went far from the relatively life-affirming short film that brought him the main prize at the Kinotavr in a short film. There, twenty-year-old Lida drank sour beer, suffered from love, was ready to cook soup for a week and eat it with her boyfriend, like dogs (these are the features of her thinking). Also, in general, the darkness.

Alexander Sokurov became the artistic director of Russian Dreams. This is the story of a teenager Kolya, who, after the death of his mother, ended up in the village with his grandmother, where he was assigned by the guardianship authorities. In the village, they fearfully await the return of Kolya’s father from places of deprivation of liberty. However, the boy and his brother Vanya will no longer see the father, who carries only evil.

Anton Eliseev sent his script to the debut competition “An Example of Intonation”, which is directed by Sokurov, and received support, shot a film about the reproduction of evil in the Sverdlovsk region.

Nothing good awaits the young hero: he will grow up – he will be like a father. The best way out, according to the director, is to escape. “Someone runs away physically, someone inside himself. We are all running from something. He was an angry teenager who fights, probably drinks, smokes. And his brother Vanya was not like that, but he was subjected to violence (including sexual violence. — S.Kh.) from the father’s side,” says Anton Eliseev. – If you drive 150-300 km from Yekaterinburg, then in any village there will be such characters. One hundred percent.

I grew up in a village where from childhood they drink, smoke, fight, lead an animal existence. When I was 20, a guy committed suicide on my birthday. So he congratulated me. We drank, fell asleep, and when we woke up, we were told that he was dead in the attic.

Actors from the Kolyada Theater were filmed in the film: Tamara Zimina played a grandmother, Oleg Yagodin – an almost infernal arsonist. Non-professional actors also participated, in particular in the role of a rapist father. By type – a controversial choice. Young actors were actively occupied physically. To liberate Vlad, who played Kolya, at the initial stage of filming they gave him a lot of physical action. Yura, who played Vanya, was sent to the village to chop wood for a week.

After the screening, the aspiring screenwriter expressed the opinion that there are a lot of dark films in Russia, why not shoot something positive. Here she writes “about the good, about successful people from good families who live in abundance.” “You don’t want to shoot about those who have everything cool and they live in Russia?” she asked. And I got the answer: “Any film is a perception of the world. It all depends on how you see the world. To return to life, you need to work actively and hard on yourself. And my heroes have no choice. They live in the deepest sleep, absolute unconsciousness. They have two ways – either slowly kill themselves, or quickly. And in life everything is solved. She’s big.”

Now it is customary to ask a question about references, about what inspired the director. It seems that in the case of Anton Eliseev – the films of Sergei Loznitsa, especially since the actors from the Kolyada Theater also starred in him. It turned out that the source of inspiration was “Pan’s Labyrinth” by Guillermo del Toro. It seemed to someone that Russian Dreams was an attempt to solve their internal problems.