There is something repulsive both in the main character and in the person with the support of which the last film was shot Zeldovich. I would not like, with the support of the well-known Roman Arkadyevich, to continue riveting such “deep-thinking” content.
As the main character in the performance of Yevgeny Tsyganov said: “And the meaning?” This question is especially relevant in the light of the attempts of "Medea" in the field of pulling the owl on the globe - rather than swinging at Greek mythology? A gift that the Georgian actress in the title role (according to the legend of Medea was the princess of Eet, the western Georgian kingdom of Colchis). I don’t know about Greek mythology, I personally have strong parallels with Tchaikovsky’s Wife. Yes, not the husband drove the faithful mad - obvious head problems in the browless girl, like Antonina Milyukova-Tchaikovsky, were from the very beginning. And to notice this, you do not need to have a psychiatrist's degree.
Only a lazy person does not scold Zvyagintsev for a black woman. However, it shows Russian realities, so typical that this can take place at least in the Smolensk, even in the Yaroslavl province, even in the Far East, whether it is the arbitrariness of the authorities, corruption or the transformation of the Russian Orthodox Church into a commercial organization. What's typical about Medea? If such a pattern is also characteristic of Russian society and can happen anywhere, then it is better to immediately shoot yourself and not live. From the horror that engulfs at the thought of what kind of world our descendants will get - a world where such Medea reign without a king in their heads.
And here's the paradox - if the viewer planned to cause sympathy for the main character even against the background of the obscenity that she created, well, make her cute, attractive, charming at the expense of at least something - appearance, rich inner world, manners, intelligence, sense of humor. There's a lot of tools. But Tinatin is even more empty than a well without water. Sometimes the level of her development resembles a five-year-old - she sits and picks her finger in the sofa during a very serious conversation of her life with a civil husband. How such a woman could be trusted with children (in life, in the movies) is a mystery to me. I agree that cinema is primarily a work of art, but still it should be at least a little plausible, especially for us, brought up on the Stanislavsky method, by the way, recognized all over the world. How believable such a mother looks and the whole story in general (the storyline with her brother, for example) is a big question. For more than two hours of screen time, I’ve been waiting for something to show me that would make me sympathize with Medea. I didn't wait. But the idea that she lives "at odds" with everything, managed to convey very successfully. Bravo, idiosyncrasy for the sake of idiosyncrasy itself. I was very impressed by the words of one of the film reviewers. Not in the eyebrow, but in the eye: Consciously or not, but Zeldovich initially makes the heroine a dummy: she is kept without work and profession, whose life is reduced to waiting for a man and serene rotation around his orbit. There is no rebellion, only adaptation.” Is it true what we see in Medea? Even if she doesn’t have a job, does she have anything behind her mind that makes her different (except tattoos)? She likes to cook, read, travel, cross-stitch, she has some fascinating hobby, she is engaged in self-education, her business, having quite a lot of free time and her husband's money at her disposal? The answer is "no" on all counts.
Morality. The moral of this “fairy tale” is as “overwhelming” as that of Mr. Abramovich himself, who is seen in more than controversial actions. It seems that in cinemas when showing this “masterpiece” it is worth distributing bags by analogy with airplanes. Whose popcorn will come back?
I am very sorry for Tsyganov, who starred in this free interpretation of Greek mythology on the Promised Land. I was pretty good at him, though. The softness of his hero is completely perplexing. Shaking for his precious reputation, he simply withdraws, without trying to protect his family and others from this paranoid-infernal creature called a former civil matrimony. Although there were already alarm bells - for example, during an excursion to a concrete factory. In fact, do you remember the saying “don’t be famous while it sleeps”? So, Alexei in the performance of Tsyganov not only wakes up famously, but also shakes the bag in which it sleeps, so that if you wake up, so for sure. And now a living dead man named Medea, whose inside has long died and decayed, rises from hell.
Do you remember the song from the movie Plastic Crow? “Don’t stand and jump, don’t sing, don’t dance where construction is going on or the load is suspended.” Don't stand next to Medea. It will crush you with its heavy weight of meaninglessness akin to gloom. And the construction there is not even close. On the contrary, destruction. In M. Night Shyamalan’s latest film Time, the heroes are physically destroyed by fast-forward. So, in "Medea" all the same - only in a moral and moral sense. It is about to fall into the frame of the rotten soul.
And here's the sad thing: Medea definitely has its own audience. As in the same song from “Plastilin crow” – “and a stupid crow, and maybe a dog, and maybe a cow” take all this heavy delirium at face value, and even vomit praise. It’s just the trend now – just like eyebrows discolor. Ah, charm, charm... Even though the Queen is naked... And the naked ass and in front of Tinatin flash on the screen with such frequency that you already begin to forget about her whitish eyebrows. By the way, I can recommend you a wonderful French-Belgian-Swiss psychological drama with a similar plot, but not pretending, by the way, to laurels of Greek mythology. It's called "After Love." The performer of the main role in the film, Emily Dequienne, did not sparkle with bare parts of the body and did not yell like a dial, but won the prize of the Cannes festival “Special look” for best actress. Well, yes, they showed Medea in Locarno and even awarded something there, but Locarno – no matter what, this is not Cannes.
“But Tina is an absolute punk rocker,” said Yevgeny Tsyganov about Tinatin. So it is so, and God is with her, but with outrage sometimes it is still important to know the measure.
4 out of 10
... Everyone is sorry, and by separation - none.
"Medea" by A.Zeldovich
Alexander Zeldovich created a laboratory miracle. A film where there is not a single unnecessary word or gesture in the script - all in the basket, all in the top ten. A film in which the luxurious seaside villas or the rickety backyards of the glorious city of Jerusalem are equalized in the rights of the white and yellow solar gamut - the sun shines the same. Along the way, the white-yellow color tuning fork “Medea” causes associations with scrambled eggs, which is nothing more than unborn slaughtered chickens, which directly works on the main storyline. The music of Alexei Retinsky, sounding in the film most of the screen time emotionally creates a sense of disaster, impending fate, the inevitability of tragedy. In fact, "Medea" is a film opera. The opera is very ecstatic states of heroes, obsessions that cannot be eliminated, decisive murderous, irreparable and incorrigible acts. The opera is very good masks, spectacular wigs and costumes, bright makeup. All this is the artistic world of the new film Zeldovich.
The director hit the top ten. The modern world has floated. Everything that yesterday seemed to be the achievement of the human mind and the pinnacle of progress (technical or social, it does not matter), today, having passed its zenith, turns into absurdity and nonsense. In a situation where values, like a coachman in Cinderella, have turned into a rat, basic, archetypal principles begin to work. The myth of “Medea”, in which the main character is not guilty of anything, turned into the drama of Euripides, where Medea commits infanticide while in an affected state of jealousy. Zeldovich inherits neither myth nor Euripides. He lives in a world where noble feminist ideas have triumphed. But not content with winning, we went on to win. And now common sense is winning. Zeldovich believes the new mythology with basic myths.
Moreover, the elementary female psycho-physiology is stronger than the myth. Time for women, unlike men, has absolutely clear physiological manifestations. And they keep reminding me that your time is running out. The desire to turn back time, to stay forever in the heyday of a rare woman, probably passed. The main character of Medea brings this to an absurdist obsession. No longer 21 or 17, but 13, 11, 5 years, 3.1 years - and then the red sofa and the posture of the embryo. All means are good for that. Creams and ointments that Medea herself creates. Ecstatic cries of "I love you." The tantrums, the screams, the little deaths at orgasm-- Medea is obsessed with the desire for eternal youth, captivation, the desire to give herself to the fullest and possess undivided. And if you have to get rid of the kids to get back to zero-minus age, she'll do it. These are natural sprouts of feminist ideas. A woman is free to decide for herself. The fate of the husband, lovers and children no longer care.
And this is where the watershed begins for me in relation to the painting. Why do the eyes, ears and mind of “Medea” Zeldovich I perceive with hurrah, and the heart refuses to accept this creation categorically? Perhaps it is because opera is not my art. "La Traviata" Zefirelli with Teresa Stratas - does not count. Everything is true, in every frame, in every gesture. Even that heroes do not talk, but sing. In that world, suffering is so great that one can only sing. The Magic Flute is also an exception, a fairy tale after all. But when from the TV screen a girl of Kustodiev’s forms, bursting with health, shouts: “I am exhausted, I am suffering,” I understand – I cannot. Opera to me is a simulacrum. Dead, pretending to be alive. The art that makes borderline mental states seem normal. Suffering in the opera is most often caused not by circumstances or villains, but by the heroes themselves, plunging into the abyss of subconscious animal desires so deeply that they can no longer emerge. "Medea" from the same category.
It is clear that the word “art” has the basis of “art”. It is clear that poetics in everyday life is more difficult to find. It is clear that the sick psyche for the artist is more interesting healthy. But the work of art is not only an aesthetic gesture, but also an ethical one. The modern world is so pressuring a person on all fronts that the diagnosis of the disease, even as subtle as Zeldovich conducted, is like aspirin in oncology. And after the final credits, I want to howl, like Lisa from Tchaikovsky’s opera The Queen of Spades. "I was exhausted, I was suffering." So for such a female-male perversion, feminists can be beaten. It's worse than that. They're capable. Zeldovich convinced me.
A thoughtful viewer from one title can easily imagine the canvas of the plot, its main stages, turns and finale. This is not difficult, because the plot of the myth of Medea, like the tragedy of Euripides of the same name, is easily accessible and regularly in demand. If I understood the author correctly, he wanted to return the tragedy characteristic of ancient Greece, to the modern cinema, which is firmly anchored in the drama. Which, by the way, is a fairly accurate reflection of the state of humanity. For prone to overly thought-out feelings of humanity, for Jason, for the madness of a beloved man is a lover who has not become a husband, Alexei (translated from Greek - defender) - traditionally flawless Gypsy.
For the chthonic feminine principle, Lilith - the first model of a woman rejected by the Creator, Medea, running for her beloved rivals and rivals - the nameless holder of a diploma in fine chemical technologies, a professional mistress and mother of the children of a beloved man, concerned - for the sake of keeping him close to herself - with preserving her eternal bodily youth, Tinatin Dalakishvili, temporarily lost since the days of the Star Anna Melikyan. Two extremes, two opposites, playing a 2500-year-old play in the land of Israel, and its finale on the ruins of the fortress of Masada, whose defenders, I recall, preferred to kill each other rather than surrender. The mutual annihilation of these extremes, not bodily death, but the complete and final loss by the heroes of the meaning of further existence is the natural result of the film. But no alternative Zeldovich also offers. He just mercilessly states. However, nothing else – having made four films in 30 years – he did not do. But is this not (from the time of Euripides) the real purpose of art?
Recently, Alexander Zeldovich’s film Medea appeared on the screens, whose premiere made a huge impression on the jury at the Locarno festival. And in my opinion, it wasn't easy. This year was a festival boom, when people did not have time to watch new products, which the jury of film festivals gave laurels. Could not this picture not win the hearts of the jury, mythological motifs this year was lacking, wanted something tougher and bloodier. Zeldovich, in my opinion, coped with this task and the third film was able to show itself in all its sinful nature. Is there an end to madness and why a man with a stone heart decided to sit down for the funeral of sins?
The narration begins with the bar of the confessional, and at the beginning the mistaken belief in the salvation of the fallen soul is laid. If the viewer is not familiar with the myth, then he does not know what its criminal nature is, but he already knows that it is not so easy to wash it from the sinful dust. And her life just began: she grew up in the wilderness, graduated from the chemistry department, fell in love with a married man. I fell in love with an oligarch. He divorced his wife and moved to Israel with his mistress and children. There is a lot of money around, lust in the house, and in the head the prerequisites of cold-blooded female madness. All right, what else can you dream of? Then everything changed. I'm out of love. There is a love of asphalt and children. You can understand why change the concrete that brings money to concrete, which brings misfortune and madness? And from this moment begins a snowball of sin, which tramples on everyone who is nearby. Apart from his love, she was not interested in anything, and having lost the sweetest nectar on her lips, she decided on a hard-revenge dish that should strike directly in the heart. “In general, everyone is sorry, but individually no one”
Lowering the rank of the proud queen and turning her into a whore preoccupied with her youth, Zeldovich blurs the line between the mystery of two. The director turns this picture into a pleasure for an avid lover of eroticism in any incarnations, where the sensuality of the process turns into a BDSM festival for any opposite main character. Medea, who killed her children for revenge on her husband, turns into meat, which is traded right and left and this meat tries to rise from the sinful ashes, but the devil then pulls his hair from behind.
Russia is not used to such frank experiments in cinema, and this is true, but I want to pay tribute to Tinatin Dalakishvili. She was able to overcome the line between silent cinema and drowned the film in her temperament and audacity. In Medea Dalakishvili, you can not find a golden aristocratic vein that flowed through the veins of its ancient predecessor. The predecessor killed her children, despite strong love, because the desire for revenge is always the strongest. She wished Jason could never sleep again and felt guilty. But in the self-destruction, fear of rejection, and murder of Medea in the 21st century, there are no lofty motives other than insanity and utter jealousy. Accompanyed the bloody game of the heroine Evgeny Tsyganov. Here he is too glorious, too good to wrap his snaketail around him and crumble glasses that did not see the impending storm in his life. His originality as an actor in this film was ousted, after all, the emphasis on the figure of Jason was shifted into the female soul. He was the ghost with whom Tinatin spoke.
Filmed brilliantly: the musical accompaniment floats in the same boat with the visual film. With each new sin, music gets deeper and deeper. There is no hope of saving the soul of the heroine in the end. It's like a melody has suffocated your last air and crushed your faith in salvation against the rocks. The lack of singing and sharpness of devouring the flesh is compensated by the melodiousness and smoothness of music. If you close your eyes and just listen to only the musical edge of the film, you can live inside the picture even without a visual, only it will be perceived less bloodthirsty and less disgusting.
By the end of the film, something starts to boil inside and something tries to escape. In those two hours, you become a heavy stone that eventually turns to dust. Zeldovich’s “Medea” is an adult prank that drops you off the reality merry-go-round and places you behind the confessional bars. The film remains a heavy metal armor on the soul, begins to get nauseous from the denunciation of crazy adultery, soul bottom and grief that echoes from the darkness. It’s hard to describe the flow of emotion that devours you while watching, but it’s too heavy a flow to make the corners of your lips rise. Did the smile come off after watching? Eat a lemon.
Someone I could love, I would be a wife.
- Ha ha. Love? This is a luxury that a girl in your position is not allowed. You should start a family. You became a burden to your mother. I'll give you some advice - settle for a normal life with your husband or even a friendship if you're lucky. But if you are so attracted to love, look for it outside the marriage bed.
- When I get married, I will be faithful to my husband.
- Ha ha. How touching... Attention is required - burrows.
- We can only afford to live in St. Petersburg for one season. Cousin, do you understand?
- That's enough. I'll give her three shows in select circles, at the top. If she doesn't make an impression, be an old maid. Or content. Nothing can be done, life can be cruel. . .
'Onegin', 1999, dir. M. Fiennes
Containers... How many? No count. Each ' purse with ears' has no use. Comfortable. Practical. Funny toy. The talking doll. You can easily relieve stress with it. And unload from vanity will wake up at any moment. Again, switching from the usual family routine. Although... also, of course, routine after a while, but still less stressful. Is sex so beckoning? Sweethearts cloud your head? Are adventures exciting? Another woman refreshes a man - what is there to deceive?
When did they appear? These are the Keepers. In the era of the great transformations of Peter I? Earlier? Oh, who would answer that question? There and the classic, Pushkin, that Alexander Sergeevich is the evil of the day for a mature maiden diva. Either to marry, or in old maidens to chop your eye, or to lean against a generous master with a cocot. Prose of life! Ordinary. Normal nature 'light'.
'Medea' actually begins with this. With this subject. From the topic 'Nature'. Everything's fine here. There is the same ' wallet with ears'. He has, of course, a legitimate wife. And in addition to his wife, another lady. For sex, for switching, for refreshment, for...hell he knows what else for... Give birth in a timely manner from ' purse with ears' until he is tired ' toy', the main rule in this game. It's like fishing. You bite, you swallow, you get caught! He's hooked. Now let her take care of her own child. Eternity lies ahead. Kids, they don't grow like mushrooms in the woods. Long. Year after year. Chocolate is a prospect ahead. Sweetie! Nega! Opportunities.
And what? What's wrong? And indeed... What?
It's good when ... crucifix, perch hangs on the fishing line. Pour, sazanne, much nicer. Oh, good, but fun. . .
The director, starting from a very sensitive, I would even say sensitive topic, provides the viewer with an opportunity to comprehend this phenomenon. What is it? A vice? How do you take that? How do you feel? And morality? Morality? Is it appropriate to talk about them? Is it possible? Is it still possible?
The twenty-first century in the yard, many will say. Were you born in a cave? Where did you live? What are you talking about? The world has long gone beyond the visible horizon. This is (almost) not even discussed. This is normal ' adaptability' if you will. That's all. That's all. And then... after all, from such relationships and new families arise sometimes. Who's got what it takes... A wife - to a monastery, say, a friend - to the throne. It's all right. Legal marriage. Or legal celibacy. Why? What for? That's fine.
So what is the author dramatizing? What does he care about? The Supreme Court?
Why not, actually? The laws of the world order were formed in ancient times. Rules - the alphabet of the agreement-contract in the centuries. Crime? And now the uncircumcised Jew, and this is the meaning and the salt of the narrative, must drink the sweets of the cup to the bottom. The one who repents in confession is the one who recently shared the bed of sin with him. Repents. And several times the author shows us the pain of words. Her words. Drops off the lips at the altar. Isn't it too late? In front of us, the audience, she is not. The sequence of events is broken here. From another plane of existence emerged suddenly. Something happened. Something. Substantial. That is why the church is a refuge of dull eyesight.
The narrative plot occupies minimalist scenes without in-depth digging into the emotional coloring. Surface and even simplification are dominant here. She's the dominant. Thinking is a powerful picture. In pieces from one to the other, to the third in the projection of the development of this mesalliance. When did the noose get pulled around her neck? Is it not at the very moment when she threw at herself, encroaching on someone else's?
7 out of 10
In my opinion, the most powerful thing in this picture is the magnificent Tinatin Dalakishvili. The director, apparently, thought so too, and for this reason built all the drama around her, and everything else helps us to reveal the controversial, dangerous and intriguing character of the heroine. This is facilitated by music, which sometimes specifically goes in discord with the narrative, confusing the viewer and forcing him to hold his breath.
In itself 'Medea' is an aesthetic work, which, I think, is extremely important, because cinema is primarily a visual art. Infinitely beautiful common plans of the sea, mountains, and nature in general. And in the middle of all this power there is a small man.
I’m not going to justify Medea’s actions, but I think she’s probably the most alive person on screen. The rest are shown as people who are unable to transcend earthly needs, lust (whether it is money and business that her husband thinks about, or a random guy who paints graffiti and wants to just sleep with her, or a Frenchman who wants power). Medea is like a person who can feel better and understand more than others. On the screen we see a person who is unable to cope with their feelings, in which she, of course, is not guilty. It's not her fault that she fell in love with him, and it's not his fault that she doesn't love her. In the end, the husband of the main character asks the question: ' What am I all for?'. And the operator with his camera shows us this world through the eyes of someone who watches the characters from above and leaves no chance of mercy.
In my opinion, a truly brilliant movie does not need to explain anything in it with the help of ' cheap' tricks. This happens repeatedly in this film. Zeldovich, when he wanted to say something additional about the inner experiences of the heroine at the moment, forced the actress to throw a couple of phrases that do not always sound like something primitive and worn-out. If the director managed to completely avoid such techniques and instead convey the heroine’s every-second state with the help of other artistic decisions (frame composition, acting, etc.), it would be much better. It is worth noting that in the film there are scenes that almost border on genius.
Despite the fact that the character Tinatin Dalakishvili is a chemist, she still fails to unravel the chemistry of love.
A'Medea' - the film is far from passable, with its own visual style, directorial approach, as well as containing references, allegories, metaphors, allusions. 'Medea' is primarily a film that can cause catharsis even in the most inattentive viewer.
Probably, many have read or at least heard about the ancient Greek myth of Medea - a sorceress from the kingdom of Colchis. But even if not, it is not scary, and maybe even for the better. Those who do not know the end of this merciless story will be clearly shocked and impressed for a long time. From Alexander Zeldovich, the director of Medea, I expected a similar presentation, something reminiscent of his last film “Target” – many misunderstood, many loved. And there and here all his heroes are real, with earthly vices and fears. Even in those moments when Zeldovich deliberately flirts with allusions to mythological themes.
Immersion in the film is greatly facilitated by selected music. It plays almost a key role here. It is amazing how subtly and heartbreakingly the moments with the mounting suspense were picked up. No wonder, Zeldovich, who was present at the screening, before the session threw the phrase that he would stay for a short time and listen to the music from “Medea” sound in the hall. He said a lot more after the credits - in particular, how easy it was for him to work with Tinatin Dalakishvili, about the first one-man experience of writing the script and the difficulties in producing the film. Naturally, when you manage to talk to the director before and after the film, you already look at him with different eyes, with new questions.
But even without communication with anyone, I see the main success of the film - an invitation to the role of Medea (although for the whole film we will never know the name of the main character). Tinatin Dalakishvili. The Georgian model, previously starred mainly in episodic roles, gives out such a memorable benefit that involuntarily, with depressing memories, fragments of their own long-forgotten quarrels pop up in my head. With a tear in her voice and a heavy, shooting look, she begins to eat her heart long before the finale.
Medea is a movie you don’t need to know much about before watching. This is two twenty screen time, expected from the master eleven years. It's breath-taking music. It's the best female role.