The premiere of Kirill Serebrennikov's film "Treason" became one of the main events of the 2012 film season. The film by the Russian director was included in the main program of the Venice Festival. The very appearance of such a work was proof that serious psychological cinema is still needed by the viewer.
In the most ordinary clinic, the most ordinary woman doctor works. The viewer does not know in which city all this is happening. It can be a capital, but it can also be a province. It is impossible even to determine the time with absolute precision. It seems that the action takes place in modern interiors, but no, no, and some rarity will flicker, making it feel that the era is not so important.
A stranger comes to a female doctor. The viewer can only guess why he went to the clinic and, moreover, to this particular doctor. He is healthy and does not complain about anything. His visit is one of the incredible coincidences that happen to the main characters at every step.
The doctor has had some health problems lately. The reason is that her husband is cheating on her. And he is cheating on this particular patient with his wife. The visitor, of course, had no idea of anything before. But now he has cause for suspicion. He no longer believes his own wife, but he does not fully trust the doctor either, especially since the woman with whom he was seen seems to him not entirely adequate. Maybe she just joked badly, but if so, why did she do it?
Treason is a film about a man who has lost his self-confidence. The blow was unexpected for him, but hit right on target. He becomes jealous, and this feeling turns his life into a complete nightmare. It was not for nothing that the director first intended to release a film under a different title - "Execution". A person who is tormented by the pangs of jealousy is ready for anything and commits incredible things that he would never have done in a normal state.
The director himself says that this film is primarily about love and those deep processes that take place in a person when he learns about treason. This betrayal lives in him constantly, it corrodes the soul and does not give the opportunity to live a full life. This is why the environment is not so important. Anyone can find themselves in such a situation, it does not depend on time and place. In Kirill Serebrennikov's painting, every circumstance emphasizes this idea, and that is why the interiors are so faceless.
The characters are constantly in a situation of choice. Is it better to forgive or take revenge? Leave everything as it is or start a new life? All four participants in the story are still young, but not so young as to break with the past without regrets. Each of them is faced with the question of how to live on.
The director invited actors from different countries to appear. They are not too familiar on the screen, and this is what inspires the viewer's trust. The faces of Albina Dzhanabaeva, Franziska Petri and other participants do not evoke associations with soap operas or entertainment programs. The viewer just sees people who tell him about their experiences and remind him that the one who sits in an armchair in front of the screen today also has his own inner world in which terrible and strange things can happen.
