As Alexei Navalny says at the start of this film, “let’s make a thriller,” adding that were he to die then direct Daniel Roher was free to make “a boring movie about memory.”
Despite constant pressure from the Russian authorities and a poison attempt back in 2020, Putin’s political nemesis didn’t die, and so Roher’s film does indeed take the form of a gripping thriller…one all the more chilling and prescient given the current situation in Russia, and the fact that Navalny has recently been sentenced to nine years in prison after a Russian fraud conviction.
The film had its premiere at Sundance as a late inclusion, but so much has happened since its screening there that it has taken on significantly deeper resonance. The Russian war with Ukraine may well be dominating the headlines, but the story of Alexei Navalny feels all the more important given how it shines a brutal light on just how hard it is to fight for change in Russia.
The film starts on January 7 2021 as Navalny is seen boarding a plane taking him back to Moscow. He is filmed by television crews and ordinary folk with mobile phones, but sat alongside wife Yulia he is well aware that his return is bound to provoke a response from the Putin regime…especially given what has happened to him in recent years. The film’s storyline then flips back three years, interspersed with interviews telling the story of the charismatic and provocative Navalny.
Formerly a presidential candidate (there is archival footage of him campaigning and gathering large crowds), Navalny was poisoned by the nerve agent Novichok in the remote Siberian town of Tomsk in August 2020 where he was making a film about corruption. He managed to survive and with the aid of citizen-journalist Christo Grozev from Bellingcat (a Netherlands-based investigative journalism group that specialises in fact-checking and open-source intelligence) he uncovers the deep-rooted plot against him.
The film features tough footage of Yulia and Navalny’s friends and supporters as they try to get him released from a Russian hospital after the poison attempt, but once he is taken to a German hospital and starts his recovery process it is his teaming-up with Grozev that propels the film headlong into thriller territory.
As he sets about investigating his own attempted murder the team succeeds in actually identifying the assassins, and further reveal threads that go all the way to the top of the Kremlin. They prepare to release the story via online and print publications, and in the film’s incredible core scene, Navalny actually calls one of his own hitmen and tricks him into telling all about the failed murder attempt.
The climax of the film sees the story return to his trip back to Russia. Crowds gather at the airport, police start to drag supporters away brutally, and Navalny tries to reassure his team and the media filming him that he will be okay. He even gives a mini-press conference after they land before heading to passport control, but there he is taken away by police. In his first months at Pokrov Penal Colony No2 he just about survived a hunger strike, and the recent court ruling marks the latest chapter in this story.
Despite the drama of the film, what is truly striking is Navalny’s innate charisma and determination. Sure Roher never seems to ask any really tough questions (though he does touch on Navalny courting right-wing support early in his campaigning career) but he does allow a vital platform for an anti-Putin voice and someone who wants to help Russia break from its past of being defined by despotic strong-man leaders. The film may be one-sided, but it is also an enthralling delve into what drives the strong-willed Alexei Navalny.
US, 2022, 98mins
Dir Daniel Roher
Production Cottage M
International sales: Dogwoof
Producers Odessa Rae , Shane Boris, Melanie Miller, Diane Becker
Cinematography Niki Walti
Editors Langdon Page, Maya Daisy Hawke
Music Marius deVries
