The Idea
On the 23rd of December an unprecedented event will take place in St Petersburg. Inside the Hermitage the film director, Alexander Sokurov, will shoot a feature-length film, The Russian Ark, in an hour and a half of real time. The camera will be switched on and ninety minutes later switched off after proceeding through thirty-five rooms, crossing four centuries, and re-enacting history on the grand scale by means of an array of sophisticated effects. As many as eight hundred and fifty actors and extras will take part in some of the scenes in this unique production.
Of course, a film-maker as serious as Sokurov is not really concerned about setting records, in terms of size and quantity, for example. He is motivated more by a sense of artistic purpose, by the idea of making an expansive film, in one breath, as it were. The film, like all films by Sokurov, will contain his visual meditations on the history of the Russian people and the lives of their descendants today, an amazing voyage through war, revolution, and social upheaval, which has left in its wake all the landmarks of a great culture. Like the biblical Ark, the Hermitage has steered a difficult course through the adverse currents of time and tide. A treasure-house of life and art, it is also a testament to the buoyancy of the human spirit.
We have lost or forgotten some of our traditions; we have greatly altered our way of life, for better or for worse; and our social behaviour and attitudes towards each other have changed radically over the centuries. Only the creation of the finest art, architecture, music and literature can sustain the idea of a greater humanity, and give it a point of anchorage for the future, a safe haven from the storm.
