The Event (2015)
Explore the chaotic end of the USSR through gripping footage; ideal for history buffs and political intrigue fans.
Genres: Documentary
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The Event(2015)
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Overview
In August 1991 a failed coup d'état attempt (known as Putsch) led by a group of hard-core communists in Moscow, ended the 70-year-long rule of the Soviets. The USSR collapsed soon after, and the tricolour of the sovereign Russian Federation flew over Kremlin. As president Gorbachev was detained by the coup leaders, state-run TV and radio channels, usurped by the putschists, broadcast Tchaikovsky's "Swan Lake" instead of news bulletins, and crowds of protestors gathered around Moscow's White House, preparing to defend the stronghold of democratic opposition led by Boris Yeltsin, in the city of Leningrad thousands of confused, scared, excited and desperate people poured into the streets to become a part of the event, which was supposed to change their destiny. A quarter of a century later, Sergei Loznitsa revisits the dramatic moments of August 1991 and casts an eye on the event which was hailed worldwide as the birth of "Russian democracy".
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Featured User Reviews
**_Remember the main thing—shoot them, but without hatred._** It is tempting when you have lived your entire life in a 'stable' liberal democracy to fall into a sense of complacency about 'the way things are'—great political upheaval becomes something that happens elsewhere, to other people, or even something that belongs in a textbook. I wasn't aware of the historical circumstances that _The Event_ and the film does nothing to provide any additional contextual information. Instead, the film shows us found footage from the streets of Leningrad during the duration of the event. The film is filled with the faces of ordinary Russians—some worried, some bored, all seemingly subject to forces well beyond their control. Some march, in support of either faction, some merely wait. Putin is glimpsed helping Yeltsin into a car. Speeches are made, figures are denounced but everything seems to proceed with a sort of grim inevitability. The cameras move through crowds; some people notice and hide their faces but many more just gaze into the lens or are too deep in conversation to notice. It isn't difficult to get into the mindset of many ordinary Russians we see on screen; tired of perceived inequality with the west and keen for a change. Many people seen are clearly disillusioned with communism and feel no compunction about a move towards market capitalism. The film doesn't provide any sort of overt judgement of this, but with hindsight many of the things we hear said take on a tragic undertone. These people genuinely thought that with a move away from communism a better Russia would come. The use of existing footage without any contemporary voiceover creates a sense of immersion in the events unlike any other documentary I've seen. The clean black-and-white pictures don't date the film but rather create a sense of uniformity and involvement. There isn't the sense of detachment that often comes when historical events are viewed in retrospect, which is interesting—Loznitsa manages to make the footage cohesive without appearing adrift of the present day. It's an extraordinary film, utterly immersive, and one that can tell us a lot about long-term thinking. Осторожнее с желаниями.
