By Oli Wiencke
Leviathan director Andrei Zvyagintsev: ‘Living in Russia is like being in a minefield’. [1]
A decade on from its release to critical acclaim at the Cannes Film Festival, Zvyagintsev’s Leviathan offers a solemn reflection on Russia’s post-Soviet ideological topography. Released in 450 cinemas across Russia in February 2015, the film stirred vivid public controversy, garnering something of a cult following and near-instantly becoming embedded in modern Russia’s psyche. Russian X users who wish to publicise unacceptable, absurd, or even cruel and inhuman actions perpetrated by the state frequently do so my marking their posts or comments with the hashtag #Левиафан (‘Leviathan’).
Hollywood predominantly produces cinematic spectacles—those that entrance us while we’re watching them, but are more or less forgotten days, weeks, or months later. In the modern West, the idea that a film can single-handedly displace the cultural zeitgeist and irrevocably progress it somewhere previously inconceivable is rather unfamiliar. The closest instance of such an occurrence might be the partly-fictitious Birth of a Nation (1915), which is credited by scholars as revitalising the Ku Klux Klan, quintupling lynchings in the immediate aftermath of its release, and introducing cross burning to American hate culture.[2],[3] Another example is perhaps Star Wars (1977), which modernised the concept of merchandising and legitimised an entirely new genre of creative culture by spawning a wave of space-themed books, TV, movies, and games that has not yet subsided. This seemingly-unique Western phenomenon—the rarity of a single film altering the societal zeitgeist to such a considerable extent—might be explained by the ever-widening diversity of comparatively unconstrained media sources we’ve enjoyed, essentially since the 1950s. The effect resembles cosmic expansion: propelled by the exponential technological growth that is symptomatic of the free market, the singularity of transistor radio widened into the gargantuan universe of Hollywood, with its all-encompassing reach and glinting stars. We’re accustomed and desensitised to this relative heterogeneity in the media we consume because, in the modern Hollywood status quo, it seems like every second movie presents a critique of Western capitalism and its foibles—be it subversive and anarchist (Fight Club (1999); V for Vendetta (2005)), or on-the-nose and satirically scathing (The Big Short (2015); Parasite (2019)). Yet, with the negligible exception of fads, crazes, and ephemeral subcultures (the short-lived fixations upon Barbie (2023) and Oppenheimer (2023) being prime examples), our societies are rarely so drastically and entirely displaced by new films.
In Russia, things are different. Leviathan experienced such widespread traction and managed to affect its Russian audiences profoundly on a collective level because it upset the proverbial apple cart. In the post-Soviet era, the media landscape has been reshaped to effectively marginalise any criticism of the state by labelling such voices as unpatriotic, or corrupted by foreign powers trying to sabotage Russia. In this apple cart, state-regulated TV channels and widely-read propagandistic newspapers are the Royal Gala and the Granny Smith. Their skins are dull and without lustre. The release of Leviathan in 2015 represented the introduction of an alluringly contemporary variety—perhaps, a Cosmic Crisp—with a surface so immaculately waxed that it affords Putin-era Russia a startling glimpse at its own dismal reflection.
Above: the Cosmic Crisp apple variety.
In 2015, Alexei Navalny, who was Russia’s most prominent opposition leader, started the online media project leviathan.fbk.info, which collects ordinary Russians’ experiences that are reminiscent of the movie. In Navalny’s words, leviathan.fbk.info is an “infinite feed of absurd, insane, cynical and inexplicable facts, citations, numbers and images,” which, when shared with friends, should prompt Russians to “rethink their attitude towards the mess, absurdity and cynicism that today constitute the socio-political life of our country.”[4]
Leviathan transposes the biblical trials of Job to the modern Kola Peninsula via Thomas Hobbes’ 1651 text, to which its title and the sequence shot around the skeletal remains of a beached whale directly allude. The beached whale serves as a sardonic metaphor of degradation: its eponymous social contract, once glimmering with the promise of stability, now lies stranded and decaying, reverted to the decrepit “state of nature” that Hobbes lamented. In Kolya’s world, the “divided state” and disorder of the 1990s have been overcome. The social contract under Putin essentially advertises acquiescence with the centralisation of authority in exchange for stability, order, and security, mirroring the Hobbesian conditions under which the social contract is forged. According to such a conception, the state of nature is a brutal, violent, and primitive stage of human existence, as well as a war of all against all. Zvyaginstev presents 1990s Russia as equally bleak and lawless.
Above: the skeletal remains of a beached whale.
The modern-day Job here is Nikolay “Kolya” Sergeyev (Aleksey Serebryakov), a middle-aged mechanic who resides on an isolated, idyllic stretch of coastline in an isolated, idyllic Arctic town. There are some parallels with Australian cult classic The Castle (1997): in both, the protagonists are gruff rebels who fantasize about sticking it to “The Man”, and the overarching conflict in each revolves around the oppressive encroachment of corporation/state upon the protagonist’s rickety—yet well-situated—abode. Unlike The Castle, however, Leviathan doesn’t reiterate the imported Hollywood archetype of the “triumphant underdog”. Kolya remains powerless, incapacitated by the hegemony exerted over the courts by the despotic antagonist Mayor Vadim (Roman Madyanov), and by extension, the network of Kremlin autocrats and their oligarch affiliates. A photograph of Vladimir Putin, placed pridefully above Vadim’s desk, immortalises the boundless influence of this circle of elites.
Above: Kolya gazes out at the peninsula.
Zvyagintsev creates a poignant pathetic fallacy in the hostility of the scenery—with overbearing mountain ranges and swathes of desolate land choked of nutrients. This hostility of scenery is positioned to mirror the seemingly insurmountable pressure of Mayor Vadim and his crooked judiciary upon Kolya, who copes with his consequential destitution through vodka reliance. Zvyagintsev’s exploration of this dynamic suggests that the social contract, when placed under the control of an unjust sovereign, becomes a tool of exploitation. Post-Soviet citizens, who are supposed to be protected by their state, instead find themselves at its mercy, with legal and institutional mechanisms serving the interests of the oligarchic few rather than those of the collective good.
In this inhospitable setting, where cold winds flow from the Barents Sea across the Murmansk Oblast, Kolya’s downward spiral recontextualizes the redemptive arc of Job, whose faith in God is tested by trial and tribulation in the face of declining prosperity. Kolya tries desperately to hang onto his house, his land, and his livelihood while Mayor Vadim attempts to rip them away and build another dacha by exploiting a grey area of property law—predominantly unpoliced in this Russian wilderness, where the social contract, like the townsfolk’s decrepit properties, has fallen into disrepair. Kolya appeals against Vadim’s perverse expropriation, but is summarily denied. Their conflict for the house, with its scenic views, escalates when Kolya’s Muscovite lawyer and old friend, Dmitri (Vladimir Vdovichenkov), begins blackmailing Mayor Vadim in an attempt to leverage incriminating information about his corrupt dealings to force him to drop the expropriation case. However, this only intensifies Vadim’s resolve, leading to a series of violent and tragic events that further entangle the desperate Kolya in a web of corruption.
Below: snow-laden wrecks peek from the cove’s waters.
Director of Photography (DP) Mikhail Krichman’s cinematography does justice to the Outer Hebrides-esque landscapes which form the film’s setting. The opening scene of Leviathan begins with the first harmonic shift in Philip Glass’ minimalist operatic soundtrack. Synchronised with elevated wide shots of Arctic tides lashing against the coast, the resultant effect is one of instant mesmerisation. Much like the first fifth or so of Denis Villeneuve’s Blade Runner 2049 (2017), Leviathan employs a single sterile palette: muted greys, cold greens, and deep, sapphire blues, all united in a depressingly dim light. Every image is framed immaculately, and there are silhouettes contrasted against backdrops that are somehow both vivid and drained of colour in a way reminiscent of DP Ben Davis’ work with Irish pastoral scenes in The Banshees of Inisherin (2022).
Above: the coastal town of Pribrezhny, with its rustic homes and emotionally destitute inhabitants.
The collapse of family bonds, pervasive infidelity, and the betrayal among supposed allies underscore a society in which traditional values have eroded, and have been replaced by cynicism and self-interest. Kolya’s enduring yet futile resistance against the expropriation of his home reflects a broader existential struggle, where the individual’s efforts to assert agency are continually thwarted by an indifferent and oppressive system. This sense of futility is compounded by the complicity of the church, which aligns itself with the corrupt powers, further entrenching the hopelessness of the common people. Leviathan is such a searingly pointed portrayal of modern Russia that Zvyagintsev, who had received government funds to help finance the film, caused the Ministry of Culture to rewrite their conditions on how a movie gets their support. Films must not “defile” Russian culture, which is another way of saying they must support the party line and Putin’s conception of propaganda.[5]
Endnotes
‘Russia’s Putin: A New Chapter’, BBC News (online, 18 November 2014) https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-30234194.
Hal Hodson, ‘How a racist film helped the Ku Klux Klan grow for generations’, The Economist (online, 27 March 2021). https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2021/03/27/how-a-racist-film-helped-the-ku-klux-klan-grow-for-generations
Desmond Ang, ‘The Birth of a Nation: Media and Racial Hate’(2023) 113(6) American Economic Review 1424–60.
Maria Hristova, ‘Corruption as Shared Culpability: Religion, Family, and Society in Andrey Zvyagintsev's Leviathan’ (2020) 14(1) Journal of Religion and Film 25-45.
Neil MacFarquhar, ‘Russian movie ‘Leviathan’ gets applause in Hollywood, but scorn at home’, The New York Times (online, January 27 2015). https://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/28/world/europe/leviathan-arussian-movie-gets-applause-in-hollywood-but-scorn-at-home.html
Comments