Sideburns
1990 · Soviet Union · 100 min
- Director
- Yuri Mamin
- Screenplay
- Vyacheslav Leykin
- Music
- Aleksey Zalivalov
- Cinematography
- Sergey Nekrasov
- Production company
- Lenfilm
Cast
What it is about
In a small town in perestroika-era Russia, daily life is disrupted by groups of ideologically driven young people. The Capella group preaches breaking taboos and terrorises the neighbourhood, while a violent gang called the Tusks tries to stand up to them. Two students arrive dressed as gentlemen of the early nineteenth century, with top hats, canes and sideburns, presenting themselves as the Pushkin club, determined to save Russia. One of them is looking for his young cousin, who has run off to join Capella, and the errand soon takes an unexpected turn.
How it was made
The film grew out of the activity of Pamyat, a group that emerged in the late 1970s and became highly visible in the late 1980s as an ultra-patriotic movement. Its protest rallies against an alleged Zionist-Masonic plot, and its pamphlets listing the names and addresses of writers and musicians, caught the attention of Mamin, who showed one of them to his friend, the writer Vyacheslav Leykin, who wrote the screenplay. Lenfilm produced the picture, and its satire works by caricaturing the language of such rhetoric.
Reception and legacy
The film won the FIPRESCI prize from international critics at the 1991 San Sebastian festival. Its blend of comedy and political satire places it among the works that reflected the rise of nationalism in the late Soviet Union.
Stills
Trivia
Origin in a pamphlet
A real pamphlet from the Pamyat group reached Mamin and served as the starting point for the story.
Friendship behind the script
The screenplay was written by Vyacheslav Leykin, a friend of Mamin, to whom he had shown that pamphlet.
More films by Yuri Mamin
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