The spirit of Stradivarius and small rivers: Mikhalkov and Medinsky opened the MIFF

35 countries will present their paintings in Russia: “Don’t be afraid, come”

The 45th Moscow International Film Festival opened eight months after the previous one. It is impossible to prepare anything serious in such a short period of time, especially in the context of cultural sanctions. But since the former qualification has been lost, and the MIFF can no longer be proud of belonging to the festival category “A”, then you can not rush to meet world standards, just hold an opening ceremony.

Its presenter Egor Beroev quickly and without errors presented all the programs and the jury. Only the president of the jury of the main competition, Rahul Ravel, who arrived from Mumbai, took the stage. He began his career as an assistant director with Raj Kapoor in the films “My name is a clown” and “Bobby”, later wrote a book about his teacher, made films, combining creative activity with the work of a film official. Ravel slowly and solemnly floated onto the stage to receive the reins of government from Nikita Mikhalkov for the period of the festival and read a lengthy speech from a piece of paper. Colombian film director Ciro Guerra was also a member of the main jury. In this company, he has the strongest international background. His film “Embrace of the Serpent” received the main prize in the “Directors’ Biweekly” at the Cannes Film Festival. In 2019, Guerra competed at the Venice Film Festival with the film Waiting for the Barbarians, starring Johnny Depp and Robert Pattinson. In 2017, he came to the Yakutsk International Film Festival, and the photograph taken there now accompanies all printed and visual products of the MIFF.

Mikhalkov presented the special prize “I Believe. Konstantin Stanislavsky” for conquering the heights of acting skills to Irina Kupchenko. In response, she lifted her donor to the skies, saying that the scale of his personality would be fully appreciated by descendants, and spoke about meetings with prominent people throughout her career. Mikhalkov shouted twice: “Kupchenko – Stradivarius.” The meaning of his speech boiled down to the fact that the violins are all alike, they have the same number of strings, but there is Stradivari, and this is Kupchenko.

The audience in the hall sat with gloomy faces. Mikhalkov tried to get her out of the state of “sitting at gunpoint”, urged her to rejoice that guests and participants from 35 countries were not afraid and came to us. The main competition includes films from Serbia, Romania, China, Argentina, Bulgaria, Bolivia, Japan, Mexico, as well as Russian films “First Love” by Svetlana Proskurina and “14+. Continuation “Andrey Zaitsev.

On the opening day, the film “Bullfinch” by Boris Khlebnikov was presented without interruption. Only producer Sergei Selyanov took the stage. “This film is about us, about you, but in general it is about fishermen,” that’s the whole idea. The screening began, the audience hurriedly left the hall, but this is an old tradition of the MIFF – not to watch a movie on the opening day.

“Bullfinch” was created for more than three years. For the first time, Boris Khlebnikov made a movie on a staged scale, but this is like a deception that leads away from the essence. The film is based on Georgy Vladimov’s novel “Three Minutes of Silence”, written in 1969, published with cuts and relatively recently appeared in its original version. It is based on the writer’s personal experience as a sailor on a northern fishing boat. Scriptwriters Natalia Meshchaninova and Boris Khlebnikov moved the action to the present day, and these are completely different realities compared to those described by the author of the novel. The accents shifted, and the main characters became practically “minor people” – two young guys Nikita and Maxim, who ended up on the fishing vessel Snegir. Their roles were played by the director’s son Makar Khlebnikov and Oleg Savostyuk, who starred with Natalia Meshchaninova in One Little Night Secret. Crew members were played by Alexander Robak, Sergei Nasedkin, Timofei Tribuntsev, the deceased Yevgeny Syty… Many actors constantly work with Khlebnikov, but some of them have changed their sense of truth, they play a lot, which contradicts what Boris cultivates in his cinema. “Bullfinch” begins as a drama of generations, where adult uncles show absolute deafness in relation to the young, then everything develops into a disaster film, almost “Titanic” in the Russian way. The complex shipwreck scenes were filmed in a specially built pool. But in the end we got a creepy story about the eternal Russian slovenliness, drunkenness, irresponsibility. The “old men” brought the situation to the limit, ruined the lives of the young, sobered up a little, were afraid of what they had done, and let’s continue to drink, walk, live according to the established scenario.

For the second time, the national competition “Russian Premieres” is held at the MIFF, the jury of which is headed by Alexei Uchitel. One of the first shown in his program “Hell” was a student of Vladimir Menshov, Stanislav Svetlov, who touched the older generation. The film tells about the fabulously beautiful and touching life in the Russian provinces, where 12-year-old Ada and her mother live. A small town in central Russia was found on the banks of the Oka in the Nizhny Novgorod region. In Gorbatov, local residents still remember how they filmed at Mikhalkov’s, burned shards from Fedorchenko’s shovels at Ovsyanki. The young actress Maria Kozhukhantseva played a child of nature. E the heroine kisses whiskers, feels the feeling of first love, and all this is like from the life of moths. The director-debutant was born in Rybinsk. Screenwriters Evgeny Baranov and Denis Osokin are also not from the capitals, they appreciate the poetics of the river, a quiet life away from the noise of a big city. Residents of Gorbatov, local schoolchildren were filmed in the film. Everyone tried to contribute to the common cause, almost a folk cinema was born. The result was a kind of abstract idyll about Russian beauty and the deep life of the spirit outside of society. The film will soon be shown at the Beijing International Children’s Film Festival.