What happened to the entertainment industry in Russia last week?

Cinemas in Russia began to close. The first of these is St. It was the Mirage Cinema, located in the Atlantic City shopping center in St. Petersburg. Bumaga publication, citing representatives of the network, reported that the shopping center did not renew the lease, because “the development plans of the shopping complex do not coincide with the development plans of the cinema.” Viktor Rudman, Managing Director of Mirage Cinema, said the network will close a number of other facilities in the regions in April.

According to his estimations, only half of all cinemas could remain in the country by mid-May.

Big problems can also arise for cinemas that do not belong to large chains. Established within the Council of Europe, the Eurimages Project and the Cinema Support Fund is ending the membership of Russia, which has been a member of the organization since 2011. Among the cinemas accredited by Eurimages, St. Petersburg Cinema House and Moscow Pioneer, St. Petersburg Chaika, Kaliningrad Zarya and Nizhny Novgorod Orlyonok.

Moreover, during the period of cooperation with Russia, the foundation regularly allocated large sums to support its fiction and documentary projects. Among them – “Dislike” by Andrei Zvyagintsev, “Arrhythmia” by Boris Khlebnikov, “The Man Who Surprised Everyone” and “Captain Volkogonov Escaped” (the film was supposed to be released on April 7, but was cut off the screening schedule) Natasha Merkulova and Alexei Chupov by, “Heart of the World” by Natalia Meshchaninova, “Plant” by Yuri Bykov and other paintings.

Producer Sergei Selyanov (his company STV is now rebroadcasting Alexei Balabanov’s films) believes that the number of Russian films could double in the coming years: increased government support from the Cinema Fund somewhat offsets the cost increase. Speaking to Film Distributor Bulletin, Selyanov said, “It’s not just equipment, software, but fabrics, paints, tools, tools, building materials, etc. things like that,” he says. At the same time, the producer states that Hollywood movies will “probably return, but no one knows when.” “Needless to say, Hollywood movies make up 75% of box office revenues. Russian producers don’t feel very sorry for Hollywood, but they do feel very sorry for the movies.

There is no Russian cinema without cinema.”

Alexander Zenin, technical director of the Incine group of companies, believes that “when the last foreign blockbuster disappears from the repertoire, it will unfortunately crash at the box office.” The problem isn’t just that there are no Hollywood blockbusters:

“As you know, the cinema makes money at the bar, but if the audience no longer goes to the cinema, the popcorn is not sold. Popcorn’s raw material is not produced in our country and problems will arise with it soon,” he said.

According to Zenin, the last resources of Russian cinemas were already exhausted within two years of the pandemic. “I had to remove old recycled lamps from cabinets, wash old disposable filters. Now we had just come out of the pandemic, from a state of absolute austerity, and it looked like we were on the verge of a new phase. But it happened.

And now it will be very difficult for cinemas with equipment older than seven years,” an Incine representative said in an interview with BK.

Zenin explains that movie theaters are technically powered primarily by projectors and movie presenters. This equipment is certified by the American consortium Digital Cinema Initiatives (DCI). Or rather, certified. “It’s important to understand that if you don’t upgrade equipment and licenses on the same digital projectors and movie servers, some new versions of content will stop playing,” Zenin continues. – Russian content is unlikely to be available in any new DCP version and will certainly be played. However, you may need to upgrade the equipment to play foreign movies.

The Association of Cinema Owners asked for support from the state in March in the amount of 4.2 billion rubles, which, according to experts, equates to losses in the revenues of the networks. But even if this request is granted, it is only a matter of delaying the general problem that could have been avoided by the return of Western paintings.

According to Selyanov, “Reruns, which distributors, producers, cinemas have to deal with, are no longer such a hopeless idea. <...> But in any case, it’s clear that re-releases are an aid to the movie distribution system. They occupy a certain space, they are not infinite, so you should not abuse them.

In April, both episodes of Pyotr Buslov’s “Boomer” will be added to the list of films returning to the big screen. But all Disney-related projects – including those that have already been released (for example, Kenneth Branagh’s “Death on the Nile”) will disappear.

Also, Lionsgate (owner of the Twilight, The Hunger Games and John Wick series) joined studios leaving Russia. Thus, the release of the movie “The Unbearable Weight of a Great Talent” with Nicolas Cage will not take place.

Looks like it’s time to try. According to Rossiyskaya Gazeta columnist Susanna Alperina, “Karo cinema chain is launching the Video Bloggers in Cinema project. In its framework, for example, the Chicken Curry association plans to show episodes of the YouTube show Chicken Curry Dungeons (where the stars play a kind of version of the Dungeons and Dragons board game).

Not only foreign tapes disappear from the broadcast program. In addition to the aforementioned thriller “Captain Volkogonov fled”, which spoke of a remorseful NKVD officer,

Russian viewers – at least for now – will be left without the movie adaptation of Viktor Pelevin’s Empire V, in which one of the roles was played by rapper Oksimiron.

Prior to that, Sony, leaving the Russian Federation, transferred the rights to the movie to the Volga distributor, which plans to release the movie on March 31. However, less than a week before its expected launch, the film’s St. It was learned that the press show in St. Petersburg was canceled. Soon Volga also announced the cancellation of the lease, and also promised to announce a new release date for the tape. According to the Film Distributor’s Bulletin, Empire V was not awarded a lease certificate by the Ministry of Culture. Later, the media reported that the Ministry of Culture asked the authors of the picture to review the age rating.

In The Village, where representatives of the Russian film industry are interviewed and wanting to remain anonymous, another problem arises – the staff.

That’s why, the creative producer of one of the streaming platforms states that “almost all leading screenwriters oppose special ops.” “And we can say that if the regulatory authorities really undertake to compile some kind of blacklist, then there will be no one to write about,” the source of the publication says.

At the same time, the article emphasizes that, despite budget cuts (which will primarily affect the content of TV channels that directly depend on advertising), the production of series and films will not stop due to the demand for entertainment. Available in “any state with any economy”.

By the way, according to the statements of the Minister of Culture Olga Lyubimova, the state money will be enough, for example, to organize a national film festival in Sochi to replace the canceled Kinotavr.

“The ongoing events should not paralyze or disturb us. We should not say that we will not have holidays. <...> No one should deprive us of the tradition of meeting at the Winter Theatre. The name “Kinotavr” will not be – we will find another name with the industry,” said the minister.

Earlier, the head of the review, Alexander Rodnyansky, said that the Kinotavr “will be rescheduled for a period when we can survive the current political events and return to the cinema.”

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Spotify, the music service that previously disabled premium subscriptions for Russians, decided to leave the country altogether in early April.

“After carefully considering our options based on the current circumstances, we have come to the difficult decision to completely suspend our service in Russia,” the company said.

The number of platforms is dwindling, and the amount of content available on the rest is dwindling. After British band Pink Floyd and many Ukrainian artists, including Ivan Dorn, rapper Face, who flew out of the country a while ago, closed its catalog for Russia.

In the concert industry – also losses. The founder of the “Pain” festival (its cancellation became known on March 1 this year) and Moscow Music Week showcase Stepan Kazaryan announced that he will no longer work in Russia. He went to Serbia, stating that he was “open to suggestions”.

Finally, the Park Live festival, which lost almost all of its headlines last month, has officially announced its cancellation in 2022.

“The picture of the current conditions does not give us the opportunity to include our musical holiday in it, neither for legal, logistical, nor simple humanitarian reasons,” the Melnitsa concert agency said in a statement.

At the same time, according to the organizers, “not all musicians refused concerts in Russia”, and some of them plan to perform at Park Live in 2023 “under favorable conditions”.

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In the fan communities of PlayStation, information has appeared that the possibility of trading has partially returned to the Russian online game store PS Store. Console owners in the Russian Federation can make purchases through the store’s internal wallet (in most cases, it is non-renewable, we are talking about funds already available there and refunds for canceled pre-orders, but some players allegedly managed to activate gift codes to replenish their accounts), as well as Add free products to their library. These features are only available when connecting to the store from the PlayStation console itself, and through search only. Sony has not made any official statement on this matter. Some users suggest that the changes may be due to a technical error.