“We are destined to sail forever, to live forever…”

The Russian Arkby AleksanderSokurov

AleksanderSokurov(b.1951)

Aleksander Sokurov• First worked as TV program director• Educated as historian• Educated at the VGIK as film director• Friend of Tarkovsky, develops Tarkovsky’s

line in cinema: dreams, reflections on the past, long takes

• Produced numerous documentaries, “elegies”; first feature films were banned (in early 1980s). Later films received numerous prizes (Cannes, Venice, Toronto, etc.)

Selected filmography

• The Degraded (1980) • Mournful Unconcern (1983–1987) • Days of Eclipse (1988)• Empire (1986)• Save and Protect (1989) • The Second Circle (1990) • Stone (1992) • Mother and Son (1996) • Moloch(1999) • Taurus (2000) • Russian Ark (2002) • Father and Son (2003) • The Sun (2004) • Alexandra (2007) • Faust (2011)

Russian Ark (2002)

Russian Ark• A passage through 300 years of

history and culture represented by the Hermitage (its collection founded by Catherine the Great in 1764)

• “History and life, history and art”; “simple things put in simple words” (Sokurov)

• The meaning of the title: the biblical story of Noah; culture as the ark that keeps the nation afloat.

Russian Ark

• An encounter of a European (presumably, Marquis de Custine, author of Russia in 1839) and a Russian (invisible, the voice behind the camera’s “eye”).

• The two wander throughout the halls and staircases of the Hermitage as well as through different epochs.

• Both have no idea how they got there (“accident” in case of the Russian). Unseen by most other people.

The European “guest”/ghost

Russian Ark

• Celebration of a passing, never repeated moment (as in theatre: impossible to edit mistakes)

• Tarkovsky’s principles taken to the extreme (long takes replaced by one-shot film)

• Uninterrupted continuity of the film serves as metaphor for continuity of history

Sokurov against Eisenstein

• Total opposite of the montage cinema (ironically, S. received Eisenstein scholarship as a student)

• Dream in place of “documentary”• Individuals vs depersonalized “masses”• Beauty vs roughness• High culture vs barbarism (sailors at the

Hermitage – revolutionary sailors in October)• The aristocratic crowd leaving the stage of history

(the Hermitage) with dignity vs the revolutionary mob rushing into the palace

The Palace Square, 19th cent.

Eisenstein’s October

19th-cent. view

Russian Ark: The room where Provisional Government was arrested in 1917, shown in pre-revolutionary peace

Russian Ark: Quotes

• “Russia is like a theatre”• “What kind of play is this? Let’s hope it’s

not a tragedy”• “In any case, it’s too late to interfere.

Everything has already happened”• “Russian music makes me break out in

hives”• “Everyone can see the future, but no one

remembers the past”• “Let’s go! – Where? – Forward!”

Russian Ark

Several genres combined: • sci-fi (time machine) • historical film• documentary (life of the museum)• poetic cinema (dream-like quality)• Film about film; ironically, no film –

digital technology

Making Russian Ark

• Two years of work on the project. The route of the camera carefully planned

• 36 hours to prepare the setting• December 23, the shortest day of the year• About 4 hours of rehearsals• 90 minutes to shoot the 90 minute film in

a single continuous take (“film made in one breath” - Sokurov)

• Digitally enhanced last image

Making Russian Ark

• About 2000 costumes made for the film

• Over 1000 extras participating

• Real historical objects (porcelain, furniture, some jewellery, etc)

• Mariinsky Theatre orchestra, conductor Valerii Gergiev

Tillman Büttner, Steadicam operator (German).

Sokurov rehearses with the extras

The actual Hermitage treasuresprepared for shooting

Each scene carefully planned

The cameraman at work