After the Deluge: Russian Ark and the Abuses of History

July/August 2006 Historically Speaking 25 After the Deluge: Russian Ark and the Abuses of History* Pamela Kachurin and Ernest A. Zitser The critical and commercial success of Russian Ark (2002), Aleksandr Sokurov's most recent effort in historical docudrama, necessitates a thoughtful response from anyone seriously interested in Russian history, and most especially from American Slavic studies professionals . After all, any movie that features cameos by Peter the Great, Catherine the Great, Pushkin, Nicholas II, and Alexandra, and that enlists the Russophobic Marquis de Custine as the official tour guide to 300 years of history and more than thirty rooms of the State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, simply cries out for a discussion of its historical and ideological implications. Our goal in this self-avowedly polemical piece is to open up a critical discussion about Sokurov's film, which we see as a significant milestone in the ongoing attempt to define Russian national identity vis-à-vis the West. Russian Ark is undoubtedly a technological tour de force—a single , uninterrupted 90-minute shot, featuring paintings and lavish period costumes from the Hermitage Museum , mellifluous music by the Mariinskii Theater Orchestra, and a cast of nearly a thousand extras. This stunning visual spectacle can easily blind audiences to the film's troubling political and ideological messages. The gist of these messages is contained in the film's title, which suggests that after the deluge of the 20th century, it is a Russian ark (the Hermitage) that remains afloat on the waters of time to carry on the mission of restoring Culture to a world chastised by the wrath of God. Although this reading of the film may seem a bit farfetched, it is an interpretation that echoes the bombast of Sokurov's open letter to American audiences, which appeared on the Landmark Theatres' Web site soon after the release of the film in the U.S.1 Sokurov told Americans that the time has again come for people to build arks and that there must be no delay, and that the Russians have already built their Ark, but not just for themselves— they will take all with them, they will save all, because neither Rembrandt, nor El A longer version of this essay originally appeared in NewsNet: News of theAmericanAssociationfortheAdvancement of Slavic Studies 43, no. 4 (2003): 17-22. Greco, nor Stasov, nor Raphael, nor Guarenghi nor Rastrelli will allow an ark such as this to disappear or people to die. Those that will be together with them . . . will definitely go to heaven. But as the tone of the letter makes clear, Sokurov is certain that his voice will fall on deaf ears. For according to Sokurov, it is neither Americans' ignoAleksandr Sokurov leading a rehearsal in the Hermitage. The Russian Ark, December 23, 2001 . Photo by Alexander Belenkiy. ranee of Russian history nor their supposed youthful "wish" to lead "world civilization" that prevents them from seeing the point of the movie. It is, rather, "their own hardheartedness." Sokurov believes that Americans audiences are simply unredeemable cultural philistines. And Russian Ark is his rod of chastisement. Sokurov's controversial political agenda is built into the very structure of the film. His use of the single, continuous shot—arguably the main reason why American movie critics urged audiences to go see Russian Ark—is a technological achievement that is inseparable from the movie's ideological content. It is Sokurov's attempt to realize Andrei Tarkovskii's (his teacher's) vision of the inherent equation between "real time" and "reel time.": Although Sokurov's movie flits through three centuries in an hour and a half of reel time, it aims to tap into and to illuminate the deeper, real history of modern Russia. The documentary quality of the hand-held camera presents a narrative of Russian history in which the tsars are doomed by forces beyond their control. So, for example, the breathtaking scene in which the ball-goers descend the Jordan Staircase of the Winter Palace into oblivion —lined up row by row, like in some kind of Russian historical iconostasis—masterfully evokes the tragic fate of the gloriously dressed and doomed passengers of the Titanic. However, the sheer cinematic...