Review of Russian Ark

The producer commentary and a making-of featurette on the DVD turn out to be more compelling than anything we see in `Russian Ark.' It's basically a tour through the centuries at the Hermitage museum and winter palace at St. Petersburg conducted in one 90 minute take uninterrupted by cuts of any kind. A rather sardonic Marquis (sometimes referred to as `the stranger') guides us down the corridors as we see thousands of elaborately costumed extras standing stiffly around waiting for their turn to be photographed. In between we briefly watch Catherine the Great applauding a performance of one of her own plays before rushing off to the bathroom. We take note of the tyrannical Peter the Great abusing his staff. There are a few effective moments along the way: one of the doors opens onto a dark room during World War II and the siege of St. Petersburg, but the Marquis quickly closes it again in horror and off we go back to the Romanovs. There are also pretentiously obscure exchanges between the `stranger' and an offscreen voice, presumably the director, that don't really add anything much to our understanding of the various historical periods. You would think that in the frenetic age of `Chicago' and MTV, where no shot lasts longer than a split second, this approach would be kind of refreshing, but `Russian Ark' foregoes most of the customary pleasures we expect from a movie, such as a plot, characterizations, drama, etc., and substitutes empty cinematic stuntwork instead. The Hermitage/winter palace is certainly a spectacular manmade wonder, but a straightforward documentary tour or travelogue would have been more informative and satisfying in the long run. The most amazing thing about the whole enterprise is that the Russian government gave the filmmakers only one day to do their long take. Considering all the money that would have been lost on costumes, extras, and technical equipment if Sakarov and company had failed to get it, it's awfully hard to believe that they would not have been welcomed back for another try another day.