Last year was the anniversary of the truly iconic and extraordinary writer Victor Pelevin. It is clear that the producers would like to celebrate in this field.
And here we have a product positioned as a documentary (well, if in general terms), and in fact the benefit of the failed artist chapel. Seriously, he should look at Minayev’s or Parfenov’s presentations, which really tell the story. They tell, and not arrange a buffet called “what a great artist I am!”. If only a person had talent, so there is no mention - why arrange a successive sketch instead of a story is not clear.
The next problem is the general superficiality of the material - only veils from the series "learned-married". There is no deep analysis, analysis of works (well, partial) and so on. For some reason dragged ' as it were ' criticism Yuzefovich, which is also more water than trying something interesting to tell the public.
And let’s say yes, this set of nonsense with primitive and tasteless (this is still very mildly said) animation will not go to an enlightened audience. But the less demanding viewer here has nothing to cling to - it is not clear what the authors wanted to convey.
This “masterpiece” resembles an essay in the style of the stream of consciousness, nothing more. And I don’t deserve a talented writer for the anniversary of such stupidity.
There was a TV hanging on the wall, but without sound.
I came across a movie banner. A documentary about the cult writer of both zero and our days. I immediately decided to spend the evening watching this picture.
The beginning of the film attracted interesting animation, but after 5 minutes it became clear that much to expect. Too much graphics, frequent narrator appearances. As a result, the narrative of interesting facts from the life of Viktor Olegovich turned into a view of the drawings of motion designers and the conceit of the director.
Comments were left by characters who either knew the writer as a child, or communicated with him only once.
Over the viewing, the impression was created that all the interviewees tried to present us with a superman who surprises others with his speed to drink sake and the ability to work for several hours without a break.
Of the advantages, you can select a few pictures that have diluted the plot and really high-quality animation, albeit in many ways inappropriate. In the rest, the information is already known to many people with visual accompaniment.
Minus a point for the absence of a photo with Pelevin jumping the piano.
A TV is a small window in the pipe of a spiritual garbage chute.
OM
What is an hour and a half in the life of a modern man? This is an academic hour at the university, two lessons in high school, time on the road to work and home, a couple of lunches or a flight Moscow - Minsk. And on average, there is an overwhelming number of films and this is no exception.
From the very beginning and almost to the middle of the film, we are haunted by nostalgia: the endless Soviet landscape, stories about trolleybuses, book translations, Castaneda and in general everything that has already been talked about 99 times.
It's 2022. Authors can be forgiven. They didn’t have time to read the new book. Well, at least tell me about a book from a year ago. Nope. Tell us about the book from 2020. Not either. Similar authors of the film suffer from the inertia of perception, when the new is no longer perceived. The answer seems to be that early Pelevin is better than modern Pelevin. And everyone's heard that, too.
Now a little about the good: the film is quite interesting guests, his friends, acquaintances and employees of different fields. I also really liked the cartoons. Well, the main character, wandering in the footsteps of Pelevin, resembles a literary detective.
But come down from heaven to earth. Anyone who has read anything about the author knows that critics who knew Pelevin personally are still alive. Those who have written reviews of his most famous novels might say something interesting about literary influences. And instead, the film features a type-critic with his funny ' authoritative' opinion. Such a move looks like a frank hack. You'd have to call some bloggers.
Then there's ethics and culture. Why present materials taken from under the floor? Why nullify the work done? Pelevin does not prove anything to anyone and tries to protect himself from prying eyes, for creativity. Moreover, he does not remind a modern man that one foot posts that he ate, where he went, and how powerfully messed up, and the other likes posts about the government, creeping into the private life of cats and dogs.
All thirsty, you can read the author’s favorite text again or try a new one, and stay with your personal opinion about it.
Well, for those who have few texts, read the interview, which has accumulated enough.
OM
How to make a film about a person who fundamentally does not give an interview and who is impossible to find? 'Amur waves' seems to have succeeded. Find friends of this man’s childhood and youth, find archival photos that no one has seen before, and half the work is done. Make a mosaic of all this and the person about whom the film is made and is not needed at all. In fact, this is always the case, for a person they say things that he creates (in this case, books) and people that he was surrounded. I'm talking about Pelevin.
The director of the film, Rodion, took exactly the opposite path when making this film. Well, really, 24 minutes out of an hour and a half of the movie to show themselves in the frame? Well, Kamon.
Otherwise, the movie is cool, the Amur Waves make content that is not embarrassing to Netflix. From a production point of view as well as from a visual point of view. Great.
Unfortunately, I expected something different from the film. If we consider this documentary work as a set of information about the life of V. Pelevin from his environment from his youth, then the film is good. Many photos, funny facts from the writer’s youth (the novelty was to find out that Pelevin was the editor of Castaneda’s translations), interesting animation. But I didn't see anything behind that. This is my fault as a spectator, because in the film I expected reflection on the creative path of Pelevin. She wasn't there. It was a biography of the author and a bit about what influenced his books.
But is that why they like Pelevin? It is absurd that Pelevin himself declares that there is no need to talk about my life. I have books. There's my thoughts. Read the books. Discuss them. But the whole film is built on the personality of Pelevin. Although in the end, the authors come to the idea that Pelevin does not lead a public life and does not give interviews, because he expresses all his thoughts in books. But then the question-- And why create a whole film dedicated not to books, but to the personality of the author?
For me, it would be much more interesting to look at Pelevin’s creative path, which would take a few cross-cutting themes that go through all the books. The authors could track general ideas, show the development of views on the idea of God, on human consciousness, on the material world, on the comparison of East and West. But there is no depth about the work of Viktor Olegovich. Just a set of facts and stories as a young Pelevin drank sake and ate Japanese food.
Conclusion: If you would like to get a partial biography of Pelevin, who hides it himself and does not focus on it, then the documentary is good. Beautiful graphics, stylish transitions, i.e. technically the film is very pleasant. And if you wanted to reflect on the questions of Pelevin's books, then they will not. The film mentions, for example, the influence of psychedelics on Pelevin, but does not reveal how Pelevin himself understands them and what role they can play in cognition of the world. Same with all the other topics. Perhaps the fault in me, because I myself was waiting for another, but when the theme of a film about a writer who himself puts emphasis in the text, not on the plot or cultivation of his own person, but on philosophical and esoteric thoughts wrapped in an artistic form, I would like to see the same in the story about the writer himself. But that's not in the movie.
Not that I expected a lot of good from Rodion Chepel...
It is nice that MTS invest in documentary films, even more pleasant that their attention fell not on the historical plot or personality, not on technology and natural science, but on a cultural phenomenon. And Pelevin, no matter how twisted, if not by himself, then even as the most striking representative of Russian metaphysics in literature, is undoubtedly such.
But it's frankly weak as a movie. For instead of animation here is a completely stupid and meaningless "Corporate Art Style", as if made by a neural network. Instead of music, it's an abstract glychic thing that, like animation, might not be there and nothing in the film would have changed. It must have caught up with mystery and postmodernity, but it is simply false.
It's weak as documentary.
I will not even talk about the missing business narrative, question, intrigue. The film, in fact, does not even have a clear theme, or rather it is not suitable for the film.
On the one hand, it’s kind of a biography, but the film itself seems to want to quickly forget about it and move on to something more interesting. And, the second nuance is the film about Viktor Olegovich Pelevin and he, air defense, deliberately exists only in the space of his own literature. Which makes him a very uncomfortable biopic hero. And, if it was decided to talk about his work, it is very stupid to limit the artistic opinion of Yuzefovich.
I wish it wasn’t a movie, but a series of YouTube interviews. It would be much more beautiful, although the interviewer from Chepel is no good. In general, it is noticeable that Viktor Olegovich, in the perception of the author, in one even row with Durov, is only a man-mystery, over which the director will not have enough mind.
If you want to see a decent documentary work about a modern writer, then I advise you to pay attention to the Sorokin trip. This movie is in love.