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Two Prosecutors

This Stalinist 'thriller' sets out its stall early, with a snowy prison yard holding our attention (or not) for a good few minutes. Prisoners are herded in, most very old and on the verge of pegging it. One such geezer is tasked with burning hundreds of letters to Josef himself, pleading with him to hear their case. The old guy saves a letter written in blood and so begins the story.

The note is from an ex-academic, party member and proud Bolshevik, asking to see someone from the prosecutors office. Enter Kornev (Alexander Kuznetsov), newly appointed and eager. His meeting with the ancient political prisoner, Stepniak (Alexsandr Filippenko) opens his eyes to the creeping dread of the times.

Kornev makes the trek to Moscow to see the Procurator General (Anatoliy Beliy) to make his case against NKVD corruption brough to his attention by Stepniak. It's not an easy mission. The bureaucracy and interminable fucking waiting throughout the first two acts of the film would make Kafka want to drop acid.

Directed by Ukrainian filmmaker, Sergey Loznitsa, the archaic system of power abuse that he examines has its future echoes in the here and now. As this is set in 1937 at the height of Stalin's reign, the modern audience cringes as we watch the idealistic Kornev go about his mission. Everyone around him knows how it will end except him.

Kuznetsov looks the part, callow and naive but with the face of an idealistic Soviet boxer. Filippenko gives off real death vibes, his injuries seem very real and his 'justification' argument, that levers of government need to find something or someone to subjugate to justify their existence, is spot on. I heard this point relating to recent police reactions to protestors in Australia.

Two Prosecutors is soporific and predictable, but if you can give over to the slow burn, it's a solid piece of protest cinema, relevant to today's political climate.

This is only screening for two nights at UWA Somerville for the Perth Festival - Thu Feb 19th and Fri Feb 20th.

See also:

I got some memories of Terry Gilliam's Brazil (1985) while watching this, and Armando Iannucci's excellent The Death of Stalin (2017) shows that the end eventually arrives.

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