Leviathan (Andrey Zvyagintsev 2014)

“I will not fail to speak of Leviathan’s limbs,  its strength and its graceful form. Who can strip off its outer coat?   Who can penetrate its double coat of armor? Who dares open the doors of its mouth,    ringed about with fearsome teeth?  Its back has rows of shields  tightly sealed together;  each is so close to the next  that no air can pass between."

The monster Leviathan is a powerful symbol for the totalitarian state.Greediness, longing for power, ruthlessness, corruption. And a legal system that stages the scenarios of power-mad politicians. We have seen these mock-trials many times before, recently against director Oleg Semtsov who is put into jail on fabricated evidence. Who can strip off the outer coat of Leviathan?

Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité -- values under attack

Nikolaj (Aleksej Serebryakov) tries to battle against Leviathan in the form of the obnoxious mayor (played brilliantly by  Roman Madyanov). The municipality has expropriated Nikolaj's property. A comrade from army days, a lawyer visits him He still seems to believe in the legal system, but is also quickly confronted with the reality in the countryside.
Nikolaj has a younger wife and a son in puberty. For a time they consider moving to Moscow, but this is no alternative for Nikolaj . As  another Michael Kohlhaas he fights for justice.The end: as in real life. Justice as the handmaiden of politics...
The film starts with a sumptuous shot of the sea and the stranded skeleton of a whale - a powerful picture of Leviathan. Then we pan to the world of the humans - houses falling apart, young people hanging out in ruins, human ruins, fueled by vodka, human ruins everywhere.
On top of this human residuum is the political elite that rules with the blessing of the Church, preaching the values of truth and secretly encourages politicians to lie.
Bleakness, misery, not oine glimpse of hope anywhere. While Elena still had a  potential seed of hope, here is nothing -- all is lost.
10/10

The Banishment (2007) - gigantic failure by a giant

All the things that worked so nicely in The Return just don't work here. Symbols are not hinted at, but thrown into your face, either by reciting the Scripture or by showing a jigsaw puzzle. Everywhere the pointer, see - there is another symbol. Don't miss it.
Zvyagintsev is a great artist, so this film fails altogether on a high level, though it's potentially a timeless drama. Visually captivating, but dramatically misconstrued. Alex brings his wife Vera and their two children to his childhood home somewhere in the countryside. Vera reveals that she is pregnant, but that Alex is not the father of the baby. Alex is devastated, of course. At last they agree to abort the bastard child - Vera dies during the operation. It is later revealed that this abortion might have been assisted suicide. Yes, the marriage between them is not working out, we have understood that.
Even later it is revealed that Alex is the physical father, but not not the metaphysical father of that aborted child. And this is the main flaw of the script, when it transcends from mythical, mystical, existentialist to ridiculous. Come on, Andrey - you can do better than that.
I am looking forward to Leviathan in the new year.

Another perfect movie - The Return (2003)

Yes, the title says it all: I liked also this movie directed by Andrey Zvyagintsev, the second movie I saw by him. It's about coming of age and partially also some kind of  road movie.
The plot is divided in consecutive days, starting on a Sunday. A bunch of youths is standing on a platform and jump into the water as test of courage. Remain Andrei and his younger brother Ivan. Who won't jump is a coward and a sissie. Andrei jumps and leaves Ivan, who at last is fetched by his mother. Ivan refuses to climb down, as he doesn't want to be labelled coward.
Next day, the gang mocks Ivan, even his brother - although under press - joins the mockery. They fight - and Ivan runs away. Whenever he is under extreme pressure, he runs away. At home, their mother announces that their father has returned. They think that he works as a pilot on a busy schedule and therefore never visits them. They look at him and then they compare the view with an old photo they keep in a Bible stored in the attic. Yes, it seems to be their father indeed.
Andrei, the conformist, needs a father figure. Ivan immediately reacts in a negative way, distancing himself from the father. The father treats the boys as almost grow ups, e.g. he allows them to drink some wine for supper. He takes the boys on a trip, as he has to order "something" within the next three days. The father treats them harshly. Seemingly they have to pass some rites of passage during the trip. At last they arrive at an uninhabited island. There is a watch tower, which Ivan doesn't climb because of his vertigo. There is also a house where the father digs a hole and finds a box. Then he announces that they will return, however the boys want to catch some fish before leaving. The father gives Andrei his watch and tells them to be back within a hour.
They come late and Andrei is beaten by his father. Ivan's hatred now breaks out completely and he threatens to kill his father. As his under pressure again, he runs away and climbs up that watch tower, threatening to jump down. The father wants to get him, but a rotten plank breaks and the father dies after the fall from the tower.
Andrei takes the command and they row the body back to the shore. (Ivan accepts his authority without rebellion.) While the boys are recovering for a moment, the boat with the dead body of the father drifts back into the sea and drowns. Ivan runs after the boat and shouts 'Papa, Papa'. Ivan would have needed a father - however their communication was an absolute failure
The story is relatively simple, but everything seems to be enriched with meaning  which give way for existentialist, psychological and theological readings of the plot.
The absence of any male authority is striking. The Bible - the word of the heavenly father and the memory of the earthly father are not present in everyday life.
The gang at the beginning forms a hierarchy with a Darwinist peck order, like the boys in The Lord of the Flies do.
When the father returns, he tries to enforce respect, not considering that respect has to be earned. The father is so much old school, that his communication with his sons ends in complete disaster. Yes, he tries to transfer responsibility to his eldest son, but he doesn't realize that the circumstances have changed during his absence. There is still room for a father figure, but not one that is issuing random orders, as the boys have manages to live their lives without male authority until now.
The two boys - Vladimir Garin (as Andrei) and Ivan Dobronravov (as Ivan) give a supreme performance. The range of feelings these kids can express is admirable. (Yes, of course also Nadezhda Markina in Elena was OUTSTANDING.)
While the usage of symbols and the illustration of communication failure here seem to be perfectly fitting and brilliantly applied, the same didn't work for me in The Banishment. What is well-balanced in The Return, seems to be  is overcharged in The Banishment. Thus the same recipe is not good for two different movies. Maybe I want to write about The Banishment later.

 

Elena (2011) - capitalist realism in Russian cinema

Some films just manage to avoid my attention. This is not bad, as there is always something good left to be admired. Some of my few friends have mentioned repeatedly how much they like Elena, so I watched it also and I liked it also.
The story of the movie is flowing quietly - maybe too quiet for certain people's taste. We see in the first frame a tree, in the tree a bird (as dummy in the world of animals I cannot be more specific, maybe it's a crow, but it doesn't matter). After some time this bird makes a noise and the camera looks into an apartment. Elena is waking up, goes from one room to the other, from her room to kitchen, from kitchen to living room, goes from living room to her husband's sleeping room and wakes him up, goes back to kitchen and prepares breakfast. Elena walks a lot, while life stands still. Elena is married to Vladimir. She used to be his nurse, but two years ago they married and now she is his house maid and occasional lover.
At the breakfast table they talk about their doings. Vladimir plans to go to the gym, Elena will get her pension and then visit his son.
At this point I thought that the plot was going to be too constructed, too much like written by some student of manuscript teaching class. He has a useless daughter, she has a useless son. One day the scene is shot from Elena's perspective, then from Vladamir's perspective, but this uneasiness with the screen play and the cinematography soon disappeared.
While Vladimir is working out - alone (the absence of friends is striking), Elena cashes her pension, walks to the bus stop, goes by bus, changes to train, walks to the grocer's shop, walks to the flat where her son and his wife live with their two kids. They don't do anything, apart from drinking beer and playing video games. Her grandson Alexander has a little business with pirate CD's and that's it.  Alexander wants to enter university, however his characters seem to be far from brilliant. He could get an education in the army, but this is dismissed as an unattractive alternative. He could be admitted to the university, if they paid someone in administration, but from where to take the money?
Vladimir is rich, but unwilling to support Elena's family from a former marriage, who to him are "practically strangers". Much in this script feels like an updated Greek tragedy. The peripeteia would be the heart attack Vladimir suffers from while working out.
Vladimir is now depending on Elena. He is beginning to like his daughter and  wants to bequest the flat to her. However, Elena is not ready to be shunt onto a siding. When she discovers Viagra pills in her husband's cupboard, a quick glance in a medical dictionary tells her what to do.
On IMDb someone asked, if she really killed him. This is a surprising question, because even the  most superficial viewer can - imho - not fail to catch this detail, even without having the "additional information" they are begging for in that forum.
In the end we see a beautiful mirroring of the beginning: Elena's grandchild is on the bed, trying to get up; the family is watching some rubbish ob TV and the crow still sits outside. Maybe this end is a glimpse kind of hope, indicating that the present and even the next generation are corrupted by Post-Soviet Russia, maybe a new generation will break the cyclical structures? Or should I see it pessimistically? Everything is 'back to start'? As opposite to the socialist realism? Moscow still doesn't believe in tears?
In the classical tragedies we need to have a chorus, commenting on the plot. Here this role is attributed to banality shows on TV, giving trivial advice on anything. And TV seems to be babbling all the time.
Elena is a fascinating look into present-day Russia, however the plot could - mutatis mutandis - happen at any place where Darwinism rules.