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The craziest thing is to see life as it is, not as it should be. On April 10, the multi-series films of director Andrejas Īkis will be premiered Mutiny (study Cinevilla Films) first series. It is a true-life and suspenseful story of an idealist-led rebellion against the Kremlin regime on a warship Storoževa in 1975 in Riga. “Looks like a Hollywood blockbuster. Can’t wait,” under the video platform YouTube of the published series Mutiny a commercial is readable by a potential viewer’s post.
The main battle of the film will take place in the seventh episode, the visual effects of which are created by Ukrainian specialists and which will hit the screens on May 1. “Ukrainians are being bombed, but they continue to work,” says Andrejs Ekis. He explains that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was the reason for the creation of Uprising, in order to contribute to the victory of reason, because one of the prerequisites for victory is the ability to know the enemy. “The totalitarian regime of Russia today is no different from the Kremlin of Soviet times, virtues have not changed in the army, but perhaps only a few people still see the tragic discrepancy between the ideological slogans and the miserable reality,” says Andrejs Īkis.
Real waters
More than thirty years ago, director John McTiernan’s action thriller came out on the screens The Hunt for Red October/The Hunt for Red October (1990) with Sean Connery, who rose to fame by appearing in the James Bond films. The movie The Hunt for Red October is based on the novel by the writer Tom Clancy, which was inspired by the mutiny on a Soviet warship, but ended up in completely different waters. “Our task was to tell the real story,” emphasizes Andrejs Īkis. Together with screenwriter Ivo Briedi and his Ukrainian colleagues Vitaly Dokalenko and Anastasia Dudchenko, he has thoroughly delved into the events of that time.
Two books have been written about them, translated into Latvian: Gregory D. Young and Nate Braden’s work Storozhevoj. Mutiny on a USSR warship in 1975 in Riga and a book by David Hegberg and Boris Gindin Mutiny in the port of Riga, dedicated to this shocking and carefully preserved historical fact for a long time. “I didn’t know anything about it. Even my father, who has served in the Soviet army and is interested in history, blinked his eyes in amazement and said that he didn’t know anything about it,” admits Dainis Grube, the actor of the main character – the warship’s political leader Valerija Špagina. In the film’s promotional posters, he is seen in a side view, wearing an overcoat that flutters in the sea breeze and on which the word “Rebellion” appears in red letters, just like on a movie screen.
It is an almost unbelievable turn of events in totalitarian conditions – one passionately confident person is able to inspire the crew of a huge warship and get carried away in a protest against the system, the creators of the series emphasize. “This is the story of Don Quixote. The main character’s struggle against power is his fight with the windmill,” Ivo Briedis describes the plot. It was the drawings of the eccentric idalgo of the Castilian writer Miguel de Cervantes’s most famous novel that Valéry Shpagin’s prototype had included in the letters written to his relatives already after his arrest. He had wanted to go to Leningrad, stand next to the warship Aurora and cause a revolution because they believed that the Soviet system was rotten and needed change.
Colonel’s cartridges
The multi-episode film format provides an opportunity to expand the illustration of that time, therefore, in parallel with the events on the warship, the gloomy stagnation of Leonid Brezhnev’s time, the life of a communal apartment in Riga, the permissiveness of the Soviet nomenclature both in the military system and outside it are also shown. “We created Valeria Shpagin as a person who comes to Riga with his wife and son and moves into an apartment that before that was completely owned by Ivar Veis and his family. It is gradually pushed out of its rooms with the arrival of each new resident,” says Andrejs Īkis, who Ivara During the creation of the character played by Puga, he had in mind his grandfather, who was a political prisoner and sat in prison.
For filming, the artists have found a former communal apartment, the walls of which were soaked with the smell or, to be more precise, the smell that is so characteristic of these apartments. “An old colonel lived there, who died and all his belongings remained – cartridges, passes and uniforms,” says the director. Real Latvian army warships, icebreakers, have been involved in filming the series Forums, as well as created impressive decorations for interior views of the ship and other rooms.
The scenes of the riot have been shot in the cinema city Cinevilla, In Viskalai Creative House, Andrejas Upiš Memorial Museum and elsewhere. “We have also used black-and-white newsreels shot in the mid-70s, easily colored them and included them in the series in order to more accurately convey the atmosphere of that time,” adds Andrejs Īkis.
Wealth in the mouth
Three colorful female characters will become the main heroines of the film’s domestic line: the shy Nina Špagina (Elīna Hanzena), the fiery neighbor Rita (Inga Tropa) and the defiant Latvian girl Katrīna (Agnese Budovska). “Nina Shpagina loves her husband and child. She is truly happy, but due to the coincidence of various circumstances, she is drawn into the maelstrom of power intrigues,” Elina Hanzen describes her character. On the other hand, Valery Špagin’s main military opponents become another bright trio. One of these characters is Nikolajs Bublikovs, played by Andras Keiš, whose model is the Soviet politician Boriss Pugo of Latvian origin. “With a gold tooth. Everything as it should be, because during the Soviet era all your wealth is in your mouth,” laughs Andrejs Īkis. The other two are Egon Dombrovsky’s warship captain Anatoly Tilov and Igor Chernyavsky’s admiral Nosov.
“I needed an actor whose face you can’t tell what will be the next move of the character he plays – will he laugh at your joke or react completely opposite – and it makes the expectations freeze for a second,” the director justifies the choice of Mikhail Chekhov’s Riga Russian Theater actor Igor Cherniavsky . Andrejs Īkis, together with the screenwriters, has restored the relationship prevailing in the Soviet military service in the style of “I’m the boss, you’re a fool, you’re the boss, I’m a fool” and the often even absurd indulgence of lower-ranking military personnel to higher-ups, for example, in the hunting episode with the repainting of a domestic pig a boar that Admiral Nosov might shoot for pleasure. “I have painted the grass myself, waiting for the general’s arrival,” reveals Andrejs Īkis, who has served in the Soviet army and knows about it not only from the stories of others.
Multi-episode film Mutiny is one of the four series produced in the program of the National Cinema Center with funding from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF). In January, a multi-part film created by directors Andas Miziš, Marta Elīna Martinsones, Dāvjas Sīmanis and Gints Grūbes was released. Boarding in the castle based on the novel of the writer Anšlav Egliš. In February, the series directed by Stanislav Tokalov and Juras Kursieš premiered Soviet jeans. On the other hand, a multi-part film by directors Lienes Lindes and Alisa Zariņas is expected in autumn Assistant.
Series Mutiny the first episodes will be available on the platform from April 11 Tet TV+ and from April 12 in Latvian cinemas: first Mutiny. First partfrom May 1 – Mutiny. The second part.
