THE MAN WHO SURPRISED EVERYONE
Russia 2018 Dir Natasha Merkulova & Aleksey Chupov 104 min
A forest ranger cheats death by changing his identity, to the horror of his friends and family, in this unique interpretation of a Siberian folk tale.
Egor (Evgeniy Tsyganov), a well-respected father whose wife is pregnant with their second child, discovers he has only two months to live. He takes desperate inspiration from a Russian folktale and decides to cheat death by taking the guise of a woman, risking losing the love of his family and facing rejection from his community.
Beautiful, powerful and sometimes disturbing, this haunting fantasy, made in a country where traditional gender roles dominate, features a superb performance from Tsyganov and raises potent questions on identity, love and resistance.
4-31 December 2020
Barbican Cinema on Demand
“Death and cross-dressing square off in a satisfying moral tale
”
“All the more powerful because of its deep roots in myth”
