Revolutionary Petrograd, full of Bolsheviks and monstrous rats. Bloodthirsty ghouls in the Serbian countryside. Chthonic “fortress”. Soul sucking VR game. Noble warriors in the post-apocalyptic desert. The life and death of a nerdy undertaker. This variegated series of stories is on the cover of the Russian Horror Anthology: The Red Composition anthology and recognizes at first glance the Russian answer to Love, Death, and Robots. However, The Composition writers Alyosha Klimov and Yuri Stepanov claim to have found their project before the Netflix hit was released (although they were happy with the comparisons) and officially produced it in Canada and Moldova. So “Anthology” is not quite the answer and not quite Russian: for example, in the international version, there is no mention of any “Russian” horrors, the almanac is simply called “Red Composition” (or “Red Railroad”). ) and has been described as a collection of adaptations of works by “famous European authors”.
“Famous European writers” are Alexander Pushkin, Alexei Tolstoy, Alexander Grin and Vasily Zhukovsky, as well as his younger colleagues Dmitry Bykov and Dmitry Tikhonov. Second, although he is among the celebrities, it should still be considered that he should be promoted: the fantasy and horror prose writer who at one point wrote and won comics about Besoboy and Major Grom for the Bubble publishing house. The love of visitors to the site “Science Fiction Lab”. However, all this naming is a pretty silly exercise, as their work has been heavily remixed by directors and screenwriters from different countries, and in a few cases altered beyond recognition. The Undertaker and the Pied Piper of the Mouse Village were given fantasy details, the Ghoul Family turned into an action adventure, Zhukovsky’s ballad The Tsar of the Forest (which also adapted Goethe’s ballad based on a Scandinavian legend) turned into a cyberpunk thriller, and in general Tikhonov’s last name Not entirely clear, I arrived at the credits (the short film “Prince”, which is stubbornly parodied of Mad Max: Fury Road, really has nothing to do with his “Clearless” story).
Not to mention that from the “Russian Horror Anthology” a gold collection came out of the animation (but “Love, Death and Robots” cannot be called that either). Some shortcomings can be found in almost each of the six works: some (“The Prince”) turned out to be utterly bleak, some (“The Contractor”) departed from the ideal in a single but very annoying detail, some (“Mozharovo with the hideous horror of the provinces” and the ludicrous black reflective). “The Jungle King”) seems dubious for the message. Still, “The Red Team” manages to pull it on its side through a combination of some factors: they drew great there (“Contractor”’s paper stop motion and “Mozharov” rotoscopy), here the original is a fun one. (the comic action “The Pied Piper’s Daughters” and the “Ghoul families”). In principle, a lot can be forgiven for one idea: Russian fear is not the most widely represented in popular culture, and these treasures are brought to light. I wish only good luck to those who are ready to take off. Along this path there may be dead with scythes, but at least not without silence.