Premiere of the new film Ivan Tverdovsky “Conference” will be held at the Venice film festival in the competition of author’s cinema Venice Days. “Spark” has talked with the Director about the experience of injuries and the birth of a new hero.Interviewed by Andrew Arkhangelskiye “Conference” is the fourth feature film by Ivan Tverdovsky, and this is not the case when the enumeration of the previous film just a formality. Each of the paintings 30-year-old filmmaker has become a kind of discovery. Debut “Class of correction” — a poignant statement about the manners of the modern school. “Zoology” is a Russian fairy tale in the manner of “Transformation” of Kafka, but with a slightly happier ending (a prize for direction in Karlovy vary, Grand Prix in Cottbus, Austin). The third film “Podbrey” — about the corruption, the piercing system from the bottom up — again, the impression of Russian life nowadays. The film Conference, however, similar and yet not similar to previous work Tverdovsky. The main character of the film, played by actress Natalia pavlenkova, escapes the capture of hostages in the theater on Dubrovka during the musical “Nord-OST” in 2002, leaving in the room my husband and two children… feeling a sense of guilt for the death of a child, the heroine decides to leave the monastery. 17 years later she has to take part in the mourning event in connection with tragedy. “The conference is a gathering of people seeking to live and to process emotional experience. We focused on trying to recycle post-traumatic stress syndrome,” says the Director about his film.— You’re talking about post-traumatic syndrome. The whole history of our country over the past 20-30 years — in fact, the continuous chain of traumatic shocks and, consequently, the post-traumatic effects. However, we have almost no movies on the subject. Where did the idea? Initially I had some childhood memories of the hostage-taking in Moscow in 2002. Three years ago I randomly got in the theatrical center on Dubrovka. Honestly, I thought that since it all changed. But it turned out that the theatre centre-in fact, it was well worth it, with the same interior, except that in the hall of the replaced chair. No repairs or reconstruction, not to mention the memorial centre. There now runs a circus of dancing fountains. Acrobats dancing fountains sing, loudly laughing children. At intermission I started to just ask people: do you know what this place was how many years ago? And nobody could answer this question, no one could remember. At the entrance hangs a huge plaque. It seemed to me that after all this event was supposed to leave a trace in the collective memory, at least, the Muscovites. In the end it was one employee, the waitress, who said: “Yes, we had the dark days”. These words — “black days” for me and became the impetus prompted to engage in the story. The second point: it so happened that among my friends there were those who survived the capture. I talked to them and so, too, was groping for material. Two of the actors in our film they are now working in the “Gogol-center”, when something was in the children’s troupe the “Nord-OST” also experienced a seizure. I instinctively knew that I was drawn into journalism, and I had time to artistically reflect on this tragedy. To find the proper formula that you can tell. It took two years to digest the facts. And then was born the script.— The heroine of your film, losing the baby during the seizure, decides to leave the monastery. But in reality whether it was the story of one of the hostages? In reality, there was a woman — the data on it are lost somewhere in 2017— which, after events went to the monastery. She, however, did not lose a loved one; she was at the theater with his girlfriend, the girlfriend survived. But her life later, it so happened that she became a nun. Perhaps this directly with the tragedy and not connected. Another was a woman who came to the theater with her husband and children; at the end of the first act she felt ill and went home at intermission, and her husband and children remained there. And finally, the story of two girls. The first night in pairs the terrorists took hostages in a room on the third floor. There was a small window which looks out over the canopy of the building. And here two women escaped through the visor in the first night. All of these real stories happened in the end, together — in this puzzle game. It seemed to me that I can afford to bring these fates into one artistic image.— The money for this film to collect was not easy, I know. One of those producers whom I knew — and this is the important players on the market— all in one voice said that they the material is not interesting. Someone suggested your story, someone proposes to revise my life plans. Like, enough to engage in the independent film, now we need to do a series, which, they say, “Nord-OST” at all?.. Leave and forget. But I had already realized that the choice is made and that is the only material that I really want to do. And only the young producers Katerina Mikhailova and Konstantin FAM wanted this story took place. Despite the fact that no resources then was not, and to obtain government support for this story, as we have suggested, will be difficult. Nevertheless, we are still in dialogue with the Ministry of culture and trying to prove that the film performs including significant humanitarian challenge: it reminds us what should not be forgotten. But in the end we had from scratch. Remember, for casting needed monastic wimple for the actress, it is worth a thousand roubles. And our things ��yli is so bad that we had no money for a wimple. But gradually appeared a no financing involved other partners. Today the film has become a co-production of four countries.— Through crowdfunding you also failed to collect the money for the film?— Unfortunately, no. We were asking for 3 million rubles, but collected in the end some very little money. I think that time crowdfunding has passed. Five years ago, it was possible, and good company gathered a significant amount. But not today; for objective reasons, due to the economic situation and just because it stopped being fashionable history. However, the fact that the crew and actors agreed to work for us for very little money, was a serious support for the project. People saw how we are strongly motivated that we have fire in their eyes, they were also imbued with this feeling and was ready to help. From the “Class of correction” to “Zoology”, from “some jetés” to “Conference” as you seem to develop your work in a single Director’s statement (it is now fashionable to think and shoot a series) or the movie you start as if from scratch, from scratch?— Probably, both. I don’t want to repeat myself, although, of course, know better. “The class of correction”, when you consider that it was a debut can be considered a good start. The film has collected quite a large number of awards worldwide, he has a good rolling destiny. In short, there was some temptation to think of the following story as a continuation of the previous one and move on in the same direction. But I decided to do something completely different, and the producer Natalia mokritskaya supported me in this. And as it seems, my second feature film, “Zoology”, is already much different from the “Class of correction” and stylistically and compositionally. With the movie “Podbrey” was the same story. Finally, the “Conference” at all similar to anything I did. I can say that, probably, today it is my most complex film, not only from the point of view of production, but also from the point of view of comprehension, language and directorial responsibility that I bear for the picture. When I removed the “Class of correction”, I was 23, I had a completely different idea of cinematic culture. I had, of course, higher professional education, but I can’t say that I was by that time fairly well read, and nesmotrel reached a certain threshold, after which begin more or less aware of some important things. When you take the first picture, it is largely guided by intuition. In 30 years, you can many things to consider beforehand, to build some route — what, how and why will happen in the picture. And today, I this approach seems the most optimal.— To��ITIC The Hollywood Reporter Stephen Dalton described your “Zoology” as “a mixture of Kafka with Cronenberg with the addition of dark Russian humor.” I do honestly doubt that today in Russia there is a humor that is as a concept, like American humor or English. What is today the Russian sense of humor? And whether you have it in pictures?— From the visible again. I can not agree more about the “Class of correction”, there really is quite a lot of humor. As for the “Zoology” and “some jetés” — there is, of course, is not it. Perhaps we just have different understandings of what’s funny. Today, we are all, for the most part, most of the cynics, and in this regard, the humor we have is quite specific, heavy. If you look at the same stenderu called “Comedy club”, we will see that their humor is sometimes go beyond some invisible line, turning into cynicism or mockery. And for us it is perfectly normal. However, American humor at times much harder than ours. At the same time, I can say that my stories — they are, so to speak, don’t assume the humor initially. In any case, humor may occur unconsciously, from life circumstances. But I never use it as a tool. Don’t know whether this is good or bad. About the hero “some jetés” you once said that it is by analogy with the American superheroes — antispiware. And as far as today possible and convincing “light hero” — to paraphrase our Minister of culture, the hero with good intentions and heart? For example, the heroine of your “Zoology” it seems to me quite “bright”… But as far as today, this character is able to arouse the interest of the public? — Indeed, today there is some inquiry among the production community in a material with positive, good, light character. In the final, which makes something twice a good, and in the next part three times already good… on the other hand, we see an insufficient number of convincing examples of this kind of drama in General and at the project level. The authentic movie search “bright hero” is of course even more problematic. The essence of auteur cinema in that it closely examines primarily the pain points, the bleeding wounds of the person. Like any other art. For the unprepared viewer this type of cinema, of course, seems imperfect. The incident is not entertainment. But exactly the same untrained viewer coming into the gallery or a large national Museum, admire there the works of the great artists who rarely looked at his characters with such “light” side. The same can be said about serious literature. In such a situation, the emergence of a uniquely positive character in a meaningful, authentic cinema is hard to imagine.We in the film industry tolgoe the time all demanded the reproduction of the same character — conventional character of “Brother” or “Brother-2”. For a very long time the producers and Directors keep trying to repeat the success of Director Balabanov. So much one artistic image in the execution of the master influenced a whole generation. But the time since then much has changed, and the sooner we forget about “Brother”, the sooner we will have a space for the emergence of a new type of hero, a new strong image. Take the same characters Andrey Zvyagintsev — clearly label them on a scale of positive/ negative is hardly possible. Just as soon as there is some space for honest conversation with the audience, we will always deal with an imperfect hero who has, as always, some of the disease. But today the question is not even how it is with these illnesses cope, and what new capabilities it is acquiring due to these diseases. How they change it.— You have all the features of a new Director-time, Director of modernity’s epoch. But you have, I would say, very academic attachment to one actress. Natalia pavlenkova plays almost all your movies. Why is it so?— I understand that the movie is unusual… More this is typical of the theatre, when the Director eventually acquires “their artists” like a ship with barnacles. Sometimes it works, but at some point, by contrast, pulls the ship to the bottom. But cinema is not theatre, the long-term calculations, attachment here don’t mean anything. Honestly, every time think of a new story, when you start to work on the script, I never know who is going to play later. But when it comes to the time trial and everything else, I begin to weigh, to compare the result to the audition, because I want to be in the frame. And most often it turned out that Natalia pavlenkova was the most convincing. Perhaps this is also a problem of energy consumption and energy exchange. When you’re on trial uses foamy the artist after the other five samples and he, of course, there is never a time that he physically is not able to fully immerse yourself in your story. People who run are shot in so many movies and TV series at once, I have, of course, nothing develops. That’s why I so rarely pick known media artists: the industry itself is designed so that they do not have something to give his all. Natalia pavlenkova pretty picky actress. I often had to persuade her to come to the casting. But if it sinks into the work that is given to the full. Not afraid of losing other projects or work in the theatre. There is a certain level in it. Talk about the contemporary hero is impossible without reference to its past — in our case most often sinceSoviet. Would you be interested to think about the transformation of the Soviet man in post-Soviet? We have this almost no movies.— If we talk about the various processes that occur in our society today, we can say: today, we have gone far enough even from a post-Soviet society. With and a new ethic — all those things that surround us today — it seems to me that the time to comprehend Soviet and post-Soviet experience has passed. This despite the fact that I as a person who studied at VGIK in the know and have absorbed a lot of old Soviet films and their authors. That is, the material itself is familiar to me. But now, when I, for instance, communicate with students “Towers”, you see that they certainly exist in completely different realities, and we shared just a little more than ten years. In their minds there is absolutely nothing Soviet. It is possible, of course, that this pattern is not uniform — for example, in Moscow and in the regions. But still: I see no reason today to reflect on the experience of the past to a time when new experiences you don’t always have time to comprehend. This idea, of course, may seem strange given that in my “Conference” we are talking about the year 2002. However, the main action and the narrative in the film happening today. I somehow reflective of the current experience of the survivors of the tragedy 18 years ago. This is a slightly different approach. Perhaps, then, a little later, I’d be interested in another historical era, but now it’s important for me to be in context. What is happening today — around me and my life. But, of course, in the life of any artist there comes a time when the communication with the dead becomes more meaningful than communicating with the living.
