One of the most important Russian filmmakers, but also theater and opera director, Kirill Serebrennikov (Leto, Petrov’s Fever, Tchaikovsky’s Wife) looks at Limonov, the sulphurous writer who died in 2020, in a film selected in competition at Cannes last May. This man of a thousand lives, already told in his books, was, from Kharkiv (Ukraine) to Moscow via New York, Paris or Sarajevo, by turns thug, poet, tramp, butler, trendy author and encouraging red-brown politician the annexation of Crimea. A highly romantic destiny intimately linked to the history of the second half of the 20th century.
The JDD. Did you meet Édouard Limonov before his death?
Kirill Serebrennikov. In 2009-2010, he attended a performance ofGarbagemy adaptation of a novel by one of his disciples, Zakhar Prilepin, at his request. This show about the National Bolshevik Party had a certain impact and won awards in Russia. Limonov had his photo taken with the artists and then left as he came. We hadn’t even spoken, and I must admit that I hadn’t wanted to: he had become an old villain who took shots at everyone on social networks. The fact remains that at that time, it is difficult to imagine today, the shows attracted people with ideas that were polar opposites of each other. And they communicated without it turning into a free-for-all.
“I chose to focus on certain periods of his life”
Your film is not a biopic but an adaptation of the novel by Emmanuel Carrère, who makes an appearance in it. How is his Eddie different from Limonov?
He is a character invented by a writer, even if Emmanuel Carrère relies on his books and the discussions he had with him. His Limonov is a kind of centaur, a mixture of fiction and reality. Many passages from the novel are absent from my film which is a ballad recounting in poetic language the life of a poet, a revolutionary, an avant-garde.
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Depending on the periods you explore, the Limonov de Carrère also becomes yours.
If I answer yes, you will title: “Limonov, c’est Serebrennikov”which is really not the case. On the other hand, it is true that it interests me enormously because it symbolizes the conflicts of the second half of the 20th century. I chose to focus on certain periods of his life as well as certain themes such as loss, pain, metamorphosis, injustice, revenge.
Like you, he opposed Vladimir Putin. You also share the same punk and provocative side. Any other points in common?
If I tried to analyze them, I would step into a minefield. Rather, what helps me to live are our differences.
We can feel a mixture of fascination and repulsion for him. Is this your case?
Absolutely. Besides, if I chose not to deal with certain periods of his existence, it is because they disgust me, like when he fired on Sarajevo. He embodies the post-Soviet man and, thereby, something very particular which is resentment. Today, many Russians think that everything was great during the USSR. It was this resentment that caused the war in Ukraine. But half the planet lives with it, like the United States and Hungary, for example.
“In a sense, the people in power are his students: they have adopted certain ideas from the National Bolshevik Party”
Edward Limonov would have prefigured today’s Russia?
In a sense, the people in power are his students: they have adopted certain ideas from the National Bolshevik Party. But beyond that, Limonov predicted what is happening today because he lived at the junction of two eras, at a moment of rupture. We can compare this to tectonic plates: when they rub against each other, they release energy which causes earthquakes. This is why it is important to watch the artists who emerge in these moments: they sense things before they happen, like cats, with more acuteness than political scientists and journalists.
In “The Disappearance of the Barbarians,” an article published in L’Idiot international in 1989, he imagined the mysterious disappearance of the Soviet Union from the face of the planet, as if he foresaw its end.
He announced it in several articles and in different forms. While opposing it because he had good memories of it, which can be understood on a human level. The best ones we keep generally concern our youth: when we are still full of hope, when everything is beautiful around us, when we make love for the first time. In my opinion, his nostalgia lay in his morning erections and not in the party meetings.
At the outset of Emmanuel Carrère’s novel, there is this sentence from Vladimir Putin: “He who wants to restore communism has no head. Anyone who doesn’t regret it doesn’t have a heart. »
Putin says one thing and does the opposite three days later. Like when he promised he wouldn’t invade Ukraine. He has long been friends with the great powers because he wanted to sell his gas and oil. In 2000, at the start of his presidency, he even wanted Russia to join NATO.
What are your memories of the transition from communism to capitalism?
The last years of the Soviet Union were completely rotten: it was the kingdom of lies, we lacked everything. When she collapsed, I thought it was amazing. The 1990s are for me those of youth, of hope, of energy, of rock’n’roll, while for people like Limonov, they are synonymous with catastrophe. As for today’s Russia, it reminds me of nothing other than the war in Ukraine and the incarceration of the artists Evgenia Berkovitch and Svetlana Petriïtchouk. It has become a country of camps and trials.
In 2017, you were arrested for embezzlement and then placed under house arrest. How was this decision lifted in 2019?
Thanks to my lawyers. This story was invented from A to Z. It took time because I always proclaimed my innocence even though I was asked to confess so that the procedure would go faster. The fact remains that before the war, one could still try to prove one’s good faith. People helped me, notably oligarchs who knocked on the door of power without it being said or known. Something impossible today.
“What interests me is studying the nature of evil”
You have also been criticized for your links with Roman Abramovich or Vladislav Surkov, Putin’s former advisor.
As I said at the beginning of the interview, times were different. People with completely opposite ideas could still talk to each other. They went to see the same pieces, the same exhibitions. They also helped each other. The management of the Gogol theater was the one in power that offered it to me. The films I made at the time were financed by the state and the oligarchs. And these projects were all oriented towards the West. One of the largest contemporary art museums, the Garage, was founded by Abramovitch. Today, there are police raids and searches. Many people who worked there left the country.
Since the war in Ukraine, you have lived in Berlin. Does returning to Russia represent a danger for you?
My parents having died, I no longer have direct links with this country, and given the fate reserved for Evgenia Berkovitch and Svetlana Petriïtchouk, I have no desire to tempt the devil to see how things would turn out.
Recently, you adapted the novel The Disappearance of Josef Mengele, by Olivier Guez. Why are you interested in this man?
As for Limonovthis is a proposal that was made to me. What interests me is studying the nature of evil, which was particularly expressed during the 20th century. But it’s not me who goes towards evil, it’s him who comes to me.
