Summary

Daniil Dondurei — Andrei Plakhov — Lev Karakhan

A closed can and open space

Cannes-2011

Oleg Zintsov

Continuity

Review of Terrence Malick's THE TREE OF LIFE (USA)

Detailed analysis of Terrence Malick's THE TREE OF LIFE's poetics specified by separate chapters: subject matter, space, symphony, religion, movement. Counterpoint of memory's fragmentariness and continuity of movement as the spot of the film's nativity; the way the film fixes momentarily cutoffs of reality, making the viewer feel that the world around is in the process of constant formation and decay.

Poetics, THE TREE OF LIFE, space, subject matter, symphony, movement, memory's fragmentariness

Zara Abdullayeva

Twilight of aestheticism

Review of Lars von Trier's MELANCHOLIA (Denmark — Sweden — France — Germany).

Analysis of Lars von Trier's directing method exemplified by his latest work MELANCHOLIA with a special accent upon the reasons of his dissatisfaction with his chef d'ouvre, which the great provocateur called «cream of creams». Summing up, that Trier made a film not about the coming end of the world, but about the tragedy of aestheticism, the author minutely explores all the aspects and mechanisms of creation of this «anticonsumerist» fairy-tale.

MELANCHOLIA, tragedy of aestheticism, rupture of communication, «anticonsumerist» fairy-tale, end of the world

Vika Smirnova

Endless story

Review of Nuri Bilge Ceylan's BIR ZAMANLAR ANADOLU'DA (Turkey — Bosnia and Herzegovina).

Evolution of the noted Turkish filmmaker Nuri Bilge Ceylan's creation is investigated through his BIR ZAMANLAR ANADOLU'DA. The author accentuates such peculiarities as delusive fortuity of subplots, compositional proximity to the genre of fugue and formal deviation from customary subdivision into genres of detective, western, road-movie, documentary. Impact of Chekhov in various modifications is specially considered due to Ceylan's confession that he'd experienced the Russian writer's influence.

BIR ZAMANLAR ANADOLU'DA, evolution of creation, fugue, genre, delusive fortuity

Elena Plakhova

Comedy of solidarity

Review of Aki Kaurismaki's LE HAVRE (Finland — France — Germany).

Major peculiarities of the creative method of Aki Kaurismaki — the Finnish classic and hoodlum — are investigated as they are manifested in his

LE HAVRE: interest toward the personages-outsiders, sarcastic humour, turn to minimalism and symbolism, humanistic subtext.

Personages-outsiders, minimalism, symbolism, humanistic subtext

Olga Shakina

From the life of marionettes

Review of Paolo Sorrentino's THIS MUST BE THE PLACE (Italy — France — Ireland).

Alexei Medvedev

Where there's no way back

Review of Andreas Dresen's HALT AUF FREIER STRECKE (Germany — France).

Typology of the most actual German filmmaker Andreas Dresen's creation is explored. The former «ossi» managed to convert his previous life's experience and adaptation to the new conditions. Analyzing HALT AUF FREIER STRECKE, shown at the Cannes' Film festival, through the reputation of Dresen as an optimist, the critic comes to conclusion, that, when telling of death and fixing dying of the protagonist, the director stays the creator of life-asserting art.

Typology of creation, adaptation, optimism, dying, Dresen

Olga Shakina

Saga of a Viking

Review of Nicolas Winding Refn's DRIVE (USA).

Nicolas Winding Refn's DRIVE, the winner of Cannes' prize for the best direction is considered in the context of different stages of the unique Danish filmmaker's creation. The main traits of his aesthetics are marked, such as both epical and subjectivist kind of approach, celebration

of masculine heroes, visionary, enthralment with the passing away.

Epical, masculine, VALHALLA RISING, visionary, DRIVE, subjective method

Nicolas Winding Refn:

«Genre cinema makes free»

Interview with the Danish filmmaker.

Nina Tsyrkun

Ecce homo

Review of Nanny Moretti's HABEMUS PAPAM (Italy — France).

Nanny Moretti's HABEMUS PAPAM is considered through the two authour's allusions: at Hermann Melville's MOBY DICK and at Jean-Pierre Melville as the maker of film noir. The newly elected Pope exemplifies impotence of responsible power while the fact of his pontification manifests indifference of the Lord.

HABEMUS PAPAM, MOBY DICK, Jean-Pierre Melville, film noir, impotence of responsible power, indifference of the Lord

Igor Sukmanov

The skin, he lives in

Review of Pedro Almodovar's LA PIEL QUE HABITO (Spain).

The article is devoted to Pedro Almodovar's LA PIEL QUE HABITO. The author considers as his usual motives and images in the customary construction of labyrinth, as well as manifesting themselves blind allies of the director's trade mark. According to Sukmanov, the latter maybe mainly explained by the fact, that provocative escapades aimed at sanctimonious morals, cult of machismo and repression of private freedom, lost their primary recusant nature and appeared a self-parody. The reason for this is concession to the audience which, as he thinks, awaits from him only what he has trained it to.

Construction of labyrinth, provocation, cult of machismo, parody, recusant nature

Anton Dolin

Proper name

Review of Andrei Zvyagintsev's ELENA (Russia).

One of the most titled Russian director, favourite of the international film festivals, including Cannes, Andrei Zviagintsev's ELENA, which evoked hot ideological and aesthetical discussions among professionals, is considered as the maker's of THE RETURN and THE BANISHMENT refusal from parable in the name of socio-psychological drama. Anyhow while using a chamber criminal story the helmer reflects over such a complex notion as Apocalypse, placing Armageddon within a person's soul.

Socio-psychological drama, Apocalypse, parable, ELENA, reflection

Sergei Medvedev

Veneer happiness

Emigration as national idea

Lev Karakhan

Russian «field»

Anton Dolin

Silence of goats

Portrayal of Michelangelo Frammartino — the actual Italian filmmaker, favoutite of cinefils, critics and film festivals. The main components of this minstrel of Calabria's poetics are considered: travel as territory of the banal, minimalism, materialization of a metaphor «suspended time» and primarily the idea of unity of all elements of nature. A man dying is reborned into an animal, an animal into fertilizing for a tree, a tree turns into coals which heats man's dwelling.

Calabria, territory of the banal, minimalism, «suspended time», unity of all elements of nature

Andrei Fomenko

Laocoon: new, revised

Whereas the art-critic sees in visual arts exceptionally «signs», but never «things» as implied by the Semiotic tradition, the film-critic considers one's subject «naively», reasoning the screen world as a real one. The author argues, the difference in the guideline bears institutional and historical character. Cinema undertook some functions formerly performed by arts, which refused from them in the Postmodern.

Signs, things, visual arts, Semiotic tradition, film language, Postmodern

Marina Toropygina

Paris, Melancholia

Intersection and coincidence of the same themes, images, motives, heroes in creation of three different directors are considered. Von Trier's MELANCHOLIA, Woody Allen's MIDNIGHT IN PARIS and Kim

Ki-duk's ARIRANG are specified. Categories of opposition of sense and sensibilia, romantic collision of man and element, reflection over creation, etc are investigated.

Lars von Trier, image, opposition, reflection, Woody Allen, Kim Ki-duk, characters

Aleksandra Yurgeneva

Laughter and Eros

The comic side of erotic imagery in art history and cinema; transformation of visual realization of the sexual in accordance with development of European culture; nature of comprehension of the ludicrous in cinema as a carnival action, where the frontier between the obscene and ridiculous is erased, and return to early ritual traditions.

Ritual laughter, playful attitude towards sexual theme, carnival culture, erotic photography, collective experience, pornography as a separate cinema genre

Lars von Trier:

«All the ideas are stolen»

Conversed by Ann Thompson.

Lars von Trier:

«I'm tortured by doubts as before»

Conversed by Andrew O'Hehir.

Vladimir Seryshev

Personal space

Criminal drama.

Alexei Slapovsky

What You do is very important

Cinema without words.