Innocent people came out of their homes and were arrested under false pretenses. Terrorist interrogation techniques are used to secure phone confessions. The revolting, dirty-cake prisons would not be suitable for your grandmother’s smelly pet, let alone a prize-winning scholar. A sweep, a swift punishment for anyone who doesn’t tow the party line. No, not America 2026but in Russia 1937 at the height of Stalin’s brutal and sweeping purges – his attempt to reduce what he saw as a festering wound of opposition.
Ukrainian filmmaker Sergei Loznitsa’s dramatic new drama is based on the novel by Georgy Demidov, a Russian physicist who was forced to work in a Siberian gulag for much of Stalin’s rule. It follows an angelic young prosecutor named Kornyev (Aleksandr Kuznetsov) who responds to a note he finds in a folded piece of cardboard covered in blood with a plea for help from a man who once taught him at the University.
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Sincerely believing that his slight height will allow him to walk among the raindrops of the secret police who are always on the lookout, he takes his hat, coat and bag and manages to talk into the cell of his old case Stepniak (Aleksandr Filippenko), on his last leg due to the habitual beatings and humiliation. Loznitsa extends the journey from entering the cell, as Kornyev is stared down and toe-to-toe by various guards and overseers, many of whom seem more than happy with his bald-faced moxie.
Kornyev, on the other hand, never once raises his voice or does anything that could be considered an open challenge, so he is finally rewarded for his visit. And yet it is clear from the outset that he is unlikely to get out of this situation with his right sense of morality allowed to operate in public spaces. You sincerely believe that the pen is mightier than the sword, and that’s great until someone attacks you with a giant sword.
Loznitsa’s flawless film consists of three intimate pieces based on extended dialogue scenes and poetry readings. Between these moments, we see Kornyev’s gun waiting and often dozing off. He patiently fights this invisible enemy, yet his genius shines when it comes to believing even for a second that he might succeed in his well-intentioned odyssey against the all-encompassing power structure.
Two prosecutors it offers a classic critique of the bureaucratic superstate where there is always someone a few steps ahead ready to trample you under its heel. He was shot in the press box 1.37:1 aspect ratio, the film is well-framed, blocked and edited, and editor Danielus Kokanauskis in particular finds a series of pendulum-like rhythms in extended dialogue sequences.
Yet as serious and informed as a political film can be, it feels like a variation on a story that has been told many times before (not least by Loznitsa herself!), perhaps shepherded under the banner of “It’s Kafkaesque”. A work so well done that its function and its message can never go beyond the prosaic. Still, in the strange times we live in right now, maybe it’s worth sounding the necessary and fortunate siren.
