Question, I guess, traditional: why?
Igor Kopylov: Me this story to remove suggested Valery Todorovsky. I think, not last role in its selection was the fact that I was filming the series “Leningrad 46”. And it’s really much easier. I took the “Bomb”, being already deeply immersed in the days of the late 40’s. But most importantly, I was very interested to shoot this film, because it is about scientists. We can say that we have a movie about gangsters and cops… There are films about love, sports, war. Occasionally I think about doctors. A film about scientists? You have enough fingers of one hand.
it Seems that Chekhov complained that scientists have little interest in the arts…
Igor Kopylov: So when offered to do something about scientists – it’s a challenge. The story of the creation of the atomic bomb – an event of such epic proportions that the relationships between the people associated with this, their passions have to be Shakespearean level. Platitudes will not get here.
Shakespearean passions did not interfere with you to follow the historical truth?
Igor Kopylov: on the one hand, very much kept secret. On the other, we had no problem to reveal state secrets. Something told Rosatom, who oversaw the project. Something we have read ourselves. A better understanding of the main conflict. But still, this film – the intertwining of reality and fiction. Let’s just say dotatsionnoj reality. We have real historical characters – Igor Kurchatov, Beria, Yuli Khariton (physicist and physical chemist, one of the leaders of the atomic bomb project – Ed.). They do not commit in the film what could not do in reality. But the four main characters are fictional, or rather, a collective. And undergo a dramatic collision. And the trigger for our story was the bombing of Hiroshima in August 1945. And it ends four years later, in August 1949.
After Hiroshima and Nagasaki, natural was the question of the responsibility of scientists…
Igor Kopylov: About this film. That means more choice in your destiny? Any global achievement in human history, unfortunately, are associated with more casualties. Using the benefits of civilization, we don’t think and what is their price? We did a movie about people who sacrificed a great deal in the cause. We can say that the whole country sacrificed a lot in order to have its own atomic bomb. Some historians claim that the price of its creation close to the amount that the Soviet Union spent during the great Patriotic war. This is probably an exaggeration, but not too far from the truth. When you think about it, of course, special begin to look at the postwar history of the USSR. Just imagine: incredible difficuand financial costs the project is carried out in a dilapidated country that lost millions of people. And we have canceled the card already in 1947, and in England, where military actions are conducted, and only in 1951.
But we have the same scientists worked in the “sharashka”, a lot has been created by the hands of prisoners, “soup”, and half the country lived in the barracks…
Igor Kopylov: we Have the story still about the scientists – for them, I must admit, was created the best possible conditions for work. As for countries, here too not all so is simple. The country was forced instead to build houses and to resettle people from the barracks to spend money on the atomic bomb. You know what the Marshall plan – the program of aid to Europe after world war II? And her backstory? Roosevelt promised Stalin about $ 6 billion interest-free loan to rebuild the country. But in April 1945 he died, and the new U.S. President Harry Truman said, “the Loan to the Communists? Interest-free? No, that’s impossible.” The result is that the promised money was used to rebuild Europe. And then there’s Hiroshima and Nagasaki. What to do to the Soviet Union, when in the late 1940-ies there appeared a doctrine of destruction of 20 Soviet cities? And let’s not forget that we are talking about a country that for 25 years before that survived collapse under the name of “revolution”. Of the unfortunate generation who has experienced all the horrors of social and economic experiments. Therefore, all comparisons with the European countries, even survived the military action on its territory, is simply incorrect.
When Kirill Lavrov played the Queen in “the Taming of the fire”, it is the Main designer was very real and even a modern figure. Avoid any difficulties due to the fact that the actors who starred in your “Bomb”, the creators of the military atom almost mythological, like the builders of the Egyptian pyramids?
Igor Kopylov: first, we have on site has gathered a very talented cast. And Viktor Dobronravov, and Eugene Tkachuk, and Eugene Brick, and Olga Smirnova, a long time can be listed. Secondly, we have created the human history. I told about the twists and turns of Shakespearean intensity. So the actors had something to play. Thirdly, we had the fortunate opportunity to touch the biographies of the titans. It’s worth it. And another thought, which brings me your question, and we all are willing to shoot a historical film about those who lived yesterday or those who live today?
You’re talking about the nineties?
Igor Kopylov: including. Of course, I want to reflect on the 90s, when we were young, arrogant, cocky. And I feel that that time has left its mark not only “Streets of broken lamps”, crimson jacket, cutting and shaping dough and the bandit arrows. H��Oh, we had no other twists and turns, a decent drama? Yes, a million.
We hope that you will be able to carry out these plans. But what’s with the “Bomb” – when we see her?
Igor Kopylov: Planned to show the film will be shown in September-October. But the pandemic did not have time to complete the project. Coronavirus moved the timing – I want to believe, not much.
