espadadefe Publish time 17-3-2021 04:55:08

some critical remarks

Hello, everybody, I'd like to drop a couple of line about the inaccuracy of the movie. I am not a movie critic, but I was till the age of 11, a citizen and inhabitant of the country, described in the film, and remember it very well, both from my memory and what I've been told by elder generation. First of all, I liked the movie itself. It's very well directed, music and other thing create suspense, actors are superb, almost all. However they authors of plot significantly exaggerated the gloominess of Soviet life. The world of dull, stone-faced creatures reflects rather popular clichés than reality. Surely, there were enough economical and social problems in the country, but it wasn't THAT bad and joyless. The clothes people wear, the things they have resemble rather USSR of 1930th, than one of 1980th, which isn't the same. There are a lot of children in the movie, who are supposed to be schoolboys. They wear the bleakest clothes the director could find-but none of them wear typical Soviet school uniform, which was obligatory. Of course nobody in the movie smiled, even when children are in shot. They seemingly don't know anything about sport and other games, just like people in rail station don't know the way to kill the time but with a bottle of booth or cigarette. My own memory gives me another situation. Of course, the woman- officer is wished Happy birthday with a shot of vodka. Probably, the authors of film couldn't imagine that there were others ardent spirits but vodka in USSR-but surprisingly, there were. Btw vodka was usually considered as masculine beverage, and it wasn't common to drink it in women's birthday-vines and porto were preferred in that case. The idea that Party Committee of drivelling old gits control the investigation "from ideological point of view" is silly. There were such Committees but they usually dealt with political affairs, not with criminal ones. Have a look at special books concerning the case and you'll see that there wasn't mentioned such Committee - it just didn't exist. The forensic officers maybe weren't as qualified as, say, their American colleagues, but they weren't so plain and naive as it was shown here. They DID know that there were such things as sexually motivated crime in USSR, because Chicatilo wasn't the first sexual predator (though of course he left far behind his predecessors in brutality and felinity, as well as in number of victims). They did know what covert action mean, such measures were taken many times during the hunting for the maniac. During the investigation were took into account thousands of people - previously put in the dock concerning sexual crimes, those with mental disorders etc. But of course officers in the movie could't hit upon such a difficult idea, preferring to torture innocent gays. You may read e.g. the book of Katherine Ramsford "The mind of murderer"to persuade that the film describes the story too simplifistic. As I mentioned I liked the film itself from fine arts point of view. However I'd wish the movies were closer to the facts than to wide-spread clichés and stereotypes.

score /10

espadadefe 25 May 2016

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw3475822/35061
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