Apiary

Apiary is the first full-length feature film by NOMFILM, an independent art-movie studio founded by a group of artists and musicians from St. Petersburg. The main idea behind it was to animate the numerous folk superstitions borne in the imagination of former Soviet Russia’s inhabitants. This is why the heroes of the film (real fairy-tale personages and film monsters) of the movie live and act in a semi-fantastic, half-idiotic atmosphere of a small provincial town where reality meets fantasy. Apiary is a thriller, traditional and contemporary at the same time. In its style, the film is a parody of socialist realism and American mass culture, e.g. the films of Steven Spielberg, or vampire movies. Directors Andrei Kagadeyev and Nikolai Kopeikin cast their friends, amateur actors, in the leading roles: Ivan Tourist and Alexander Liver are members of the well-known rock band NOM, with which Kagadeyev also jams. Kopeikin designed the sets and Liver composed the soundtrack. All this makes Apiary a joint effort of individuals with similar views and sense of humor. Like Ivan the Idiot, this film is also full of funny references to Russian culture, and a great amusement for those open to the new forms that Russian contemporary artists are creating in the world of film. (AP/LC)