Tribeca 2007: Playing the Victim

Russian filmmaker Kirill Serebrennikov blends black comedy, elements of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, animation, and biting social commentary in Playing the Victim, the story of Valya, an almost-thirty slacker who works as a stand-in for Moscow’s police department, assuming the role of victims in video re-enactments of murders in which the perpetrators take investigators through their crimes step by step. It’s a strange and sometimes dangerous job, like for instance, when Valya must play a woman who was thrown out of a fifth story window. But his job is the least of the troubles weighing on his mind – he begins to receive nightly visits from the ghost of his dead father, who is pissed off about being poisoned by his own wife and brother, who are now planning to marry. 

This is an excellent piece of filmmaking across the boards – great script, great direction, great acting, and great cinematography. Some of the film’s best scenes are those that take place during the filming of the ‘re-enactments,’ a term that I use loosely, as the videos are glorified on-site interrogations, with the alleged killers heavily coached through the whole scene by the investigating officers (part of the film’s commentary on the ineffectiveness of Moscow’s judicial system). Serebrennikov builds the majority of these scenes out of the video footage being shot on site, and cuts it together with the objective ‘fourth wall’ camera. 
 

Serebrennikov transitioned from directing theater to directing film, and this shows in the performances of his cast. He lets his actors act, lets them move through the scenes and riff off of one another. There is always a lot of personality in frame, and the actors never stop acting, which results in one strong scene after the next. Serebrennikov has a knack with juggling multiple character motivations in a scene – for example, when Valya and his girlfriend are alone in his bedroom – he coerces her into strangling him with a scarf while giving him a handjob, while she rants on about having given up on him, having wasted the years of her life where she should have been trying to find a suitable husband. She is distraught, he wants a handjob, and they are able to play off of each other seamlessly. It makes for one of the funniest scenes in the film, especially when Valya’s father’s ghost walks in.

The only real problem I had with the film were the bits and pieces of stylishly primitive animation that divide up the film’s chapters. Similar in result, but not as effective, as the brief pieces of animation in Run Lola Run, here they just felt out of place. Though they did look cool, they were not in tune with the rest of the film. But nonetheless, this is a film that is definitely worth your time should you have the opportunity to see it. Youthful angst, alienation, and the descent into violence are not new themes (here you could argue they have ported directly from Shakespeare’s time), but Serebrennikov and screenwriters The Prensnyakov Brothers inject enough originality to make it their own, and to make the film a totally unique experience. In terms of quality, this earns a place alongside River’s Edge, subUrbia, and Donnie Darko.