Online platforms are becoming more popular and replacing terrestrial television and theatrical distribution. The original series, made to order, with more freedom in choosing the subject, plot, and hero than usual in television movies, appealed to the non-television segment of the audience. The young and active public was very pleased with the unformatted films made by Russian filmmakers, such as House Arrest, Storm, Psycho, Epidemic, Chiki, Kept Women, Vampires of the Middle Band and others. I am sure we will look at them with nostalgia for a long time.
Basically, new screenwriters, directors, actors appeared in the work on them. TV series in the new format are not like soap operas, they are like novels: they tell an entertaining story packed into 6-8 episodes. And the actors in them played differently – more subtle, more natural. And the directors weren’t shooting with a group of eight on the guard stage, they were looking for their own style. In general, genre schemes in this type of cinema are enriched by the ambitions of the author. But there are also production issues: platforms need large volumes of new content, and investor interests require an increase in audience.
What happened was predicted by Igor Mishin, director of the KION online cinema. This platform emerged later than the others, and perhaps for this reason, it was the first to announce a new trend. Platforms that need to expand their audience are gradually forced to return to the television format in which they took their first steps. It turned out that the TV series shown on the federal channel and on the Internet were in high demand. For example, according to polls on the website Kinoteatr.ru and popular vote results on the website Kino Mail.ru, the most popular series of 2022 turned out to be the strictly traditional spy detective film Artist, produced by Premier. platform and Rossiya 1 TV channel. And the same KION successfully produced the sequel to the famous television series “Pregnancy Test”. Critics held completely different titles as a leader, but the magic of mass success is stronger than expert ratings. The series “Ranevskaya”, shot according to the same patterns as “Mayakovsky”, “Yesenin”, “Magomaev” and other biographies, launched this week on the Internet, but will be broadcast on Channel One shortly after the premiere. And this will undoubtedly increase her success: the name of the heroine is well known, the actress who played her is fascinating, the story of Cinderella with the biography of Ranevskaya is always interesting.
Following classic recipes will not make you a famous cook, but with the usual skills you will always be able to cook a normal meal. Another thing is the author’s kitchen. The gourmet chef takes risks – new flavors and combinations can be unpleasant. But this risk is justified by the possibilities of discovery.
The early years of the platform took risks and tried. Now, I think it’s time to be careful. And the author’s recipes begin to adapt to mass tastes even at the preparatory stage. Stay here, faster there.
In parallel with Ranevskaya, there is a screening of another, no less ambitious, unannounced series – The God Complex, on which distributors bet. It was designed for other audiences, and the directing is ambitious, and the script is more complex – this is an original story, a detective story with psychoanalytic elements. The director is, for example, a young and already established Fluza Farkhshatova, who made What Men Talk About: The Sequel. Cameraman Elena Ivanova knows how to create a visual atmosphere. Experienced screenwriter Alena Zvantsova has a good reputation as a lyric writer with a strong school. In Zvantsova’s own words, first of all, the craft was taught: “The television series has its own iron laws. The hero must exist in a certain society, must have certain foundations, must be an internal conflict. All is well with the conflicts in the new series, each of the three main and even two secondary characters has something to grumble. All is not well for the female characters, although they are in the background, this is the story of a man’s fight. But something went wrong with this series – and after the first episodes were shown, the comments from the journalists are quite sour and still do not cause a stir among the audience.
It seems to me that the problem in this series is quite typical. In search of originality, the creators of such stories often try to go beyond the laws of the genre, into the domain of the author’s pleasure, while the producer tries to keep them in the realm of spectator cinema. And it turns out a strange cocktail that is too simple for an educated audience and too bitter for a wide audience.
The main character, a psychiatrist working in a wonderful private clinic, is delighted to be seen as an excellent professional. He is played by Kirill Kyaro, a popular actor who knows how to show his character with a seemingly soft but sincere self. A patient comes to the psychiatrist – strange, powerful, interesting, rich. At first they did not get along, but then they started working anyway. Daniil Strakhov plays the millionaire patient, who tries to show a mixture of tragic mental break and incredible charm. The strange fantasies of a successful businessman confuse the doctor, but his desire to prove his skills becomes stronger than hunch. The third protagonist of this male story, invented and filmed by three women, is a talented pianist voiced by Shamil Khamatov. A tragedy occurs in his family – a daughter, a little girl, disappeared and disappeared just at the moment when he seduced his mother, the ex-wife of the pianist. Here, actually, the tie. The viewer correctly understands that the next action will develop around the baby’s abduction, which will inevitably lead to a clinic where a psychiatrist grapples with the perverted mind of his wealthy client.
What is confusing me in this scenario? This is not about an unlikely situation for our reality. You shouldn’t be looking for vital truth and relevance in the entertainment genre, the detective doesn’t have to be believable. All good detective stories are built on incredible assumptions. But it also requires kind, involvement, and empathy. And finally, a clear division of the world into bad and good. And the favor must win—not necessarily in the plot, but in the minds of the writers and viewers.
All the detectives of Agatha Christie are incredibly good freaks, and terrible murders are committed in such a wonderful countryside that everyone wants to live there. Conan Doyle also doesn’t paint Sherlock Holmes’s London in all somber colors – alluring originals, sensitive young ladies and an honest campaigner, Dr. Watson is alive. You can continue to yourself by remembering your favorite detectives.
But all the heroes of the God Complex are very unpleasant people and have no sympathy for anyone. Even the boy who shone in the first scenes does not arouse sympathy (as one frustrated viewer wrote in a review: “A grumpy, capricious girl who infuriates in a few minutes in the frame”).
The city where the action took place is also not sympathetic. As the director explains, it is portrayed as sterilely bleak, almost empty, designerly castrated in the Korean neo-noir style. And therefore completely unrecognizable. There is nothing in it that could be fascinating or seductive for them, so that they would like to observe this world with pleasure.
It’s the complete lack of sympathy for something or someone that can be traced in the latest series. It is as if any kindness, humanity, openness was originally sent to the category “for suckers.” Let retirees get their fair share of sweet snot on TV, and we luxury goods manufacturers will be arrogant, cold and dreary, like a stylish interior in the color of wet asphalt.
Of course, the fashion for moral freaks in the cinema did not arise by chance, it appeared as a reaction to the very syrupy positive and very terrible negative characters of the TV series.
But remember, for example, Dr. house His demeanor, of course, is disturbing. But while he was valued by the audience, he was commissioned to play Hugh Laurie, an actor with an incredibly hot appeal, that’s the first thing. The second – how wonderful and kind people who surround him, all the hospital radiates sympathy for patients and their relatives. Third, the evil doctor still mainly saves people, despite breaking the rules. The balance of good and evil in the world of the hit TV series is on the verge of collapse, but must still be stable.
Shocked by the changes in the familiar world, the audience wants to gain confidence in the moral balance, the benefit of justice in fairy tale reality. From the very beginning, moralism distinguished popular performances for city dwellers, the melodramas that the series inherited today. If an island of salvation is left to him, even the most terrible events cannot frighten the trembling public. It’s not even about the wish of a happy ending, although everyone wants it. The most terrifying plot can fascinate and excite, but only if there is confidence in its existence beyond the boundaries of harmony.
As conceived by the screenwriter, each of the heroes of the “God Complex”, called “Exorcist” in the first version, is crushed by his demon, who ruined his life. And these demons were not defeated. The psychiatrist cannot help neither his family nor his patients, the aggressive investigator (Mikhail Troynik) cannot solve the crime, the security guard (Nikolay Shayber) cannot save. Somewhere in the ups and downs of the plot, a world where crime and misfortune was seen as something extraordinary disappeared, and we looked at the suffering of the heroes as a result of mistakes, someone else’s malice, the blows of fate, but it didn’t. perceives them as the norm.
And then the writers are surprised: “Have you noticed that the mind-blowing box office numbers of movies are often not suitable for professional use? It seems to me that sometimes they appeal to certain basic qualities: envy, the desire to punish the successful and rich. It always works, says Alena Zvantsova, starting with “The Story of the Priest and his Worker Balda.” And I think she’s wrong. These unprofessional but successful films often have one important feature: they allow you to sympathize with the characters. The desire to punish evil is not born of jealousy. This basic feeling on which any mass demonstration is built is not the only condition, but a necessary condition. The immutable law of the fairy tale.
The author expresses his personal opinion, which may not coincide with the editors’ position.
Source: Gazeta
Dolores Johnson is a voice of reason at “Social Bites”. As an opinion writer, she provides her readers with insightful commentary on the most pressing issues of the day. With her well-informed perspectives and clear writing style, Dolores helps readers navigate the complex world of news and politics, providing a balanced and thoughtful view on the most important topics of the moment.