The publicity materials for the new Russian flick Generation P key out it as William Gibson meet William S. Burroughs . Which is a jolly bold claim . But with its strange drug trips , ancient conspiracies and computer - generated pol , this weird caustic remark of Yeltsin - era crony capitalist economy almost lives up to those two names . Almost .
In any case , there ’s enough ingeniousness buried in Generation P ’s insanity to remind you of the Edgar Lee Masters — and to leave you with lingering flash of paranoia . Spoilers onwards …
multiplication P is based on the 1999 novel by Victor Pelevin , which merges speculation on capitalist economy and advert with copious drug economic consumption , Babylonian mythology and bizarre conspiracy . By all write up , the novel is as much a philosophical schoolbook as it is a story with a well-defined secret plan .
The “ Tatarsky work in advertising ” plot line culminates in a scene where he meet the uber - boss , who has an elaborate rug whose pattern has been retrace with channel of cocaine . Tatarsky snorts large amount of money off the “ cocain rug ” and then tells the exec that he things living is good when it has fully grown tits , like Immanuel Kant . Actually , he adds , the good breasts areFeuerbachianbreasts . They both accord about Feuerbachian breasts , and Tatarsky is take in to join the inner circle . It ’s the form of view that you do n’t know whether to ramble your eyes or applaud the nuttiness .
Meanwhile , Tatarsky is also doing copious amounts of non - cocaine - related drug , include LSD and wizardly mushrooms . He experiment with a Ouija board and sees a uncanny visual modality of Che Guevara warn him about television . He climbs a ziggurat ( that ’s actually an abandon microwave radar post ) and learns about the Babylonian goddess whose worshippers control the world . Sweaters come to life . The forest is live , mankind . Tatarsky ’s frequent hallucinogenic drug trips lead him closer to an savvy that sinister forcefulness control everything — until at last he enters the Golden Room and see the real truth .
And in a third weird subplot , it turns out that none of the leading pol and “ oligarch ” in Russia are in reality people at all . They ’re all computer - generated , using apparent movement - seizure engineering and calculator simulations of cheek and expression . ( This is plausibly the most overtly science fictional musical theme in the movie , especially since they ’ve somehow jump off over the Uncanny Valley and created a virtual Boris Yeltsin who convinces everybody he ’s tangible . People even think they ’ve satisfy Boris Yeltsin . )
The whole thing bears a trivial resemblance to Branded , another movie about a Russian sheik who works in advertising , has trippy experience , and discovers a dark conspiracy to control everything . Except that this movie has a inventiveness and a lightness of touch that lift it way above the preachy Branded — and I guess Generation P actually come first , both the novel and the movie . I was also reasonably remind of Holy Motors , that other weird , slightly aimless foreign movie that just came out in the U.S. — except that Generation P is funnier and looser , with more insurgent ideas .
contemporaries P is certainly not a unadulterated movie , or even necessarily a capital movie — it ’s often really kludgey and obvious , full of messages about capitalism and politics that experience a chip obvious to anyone who ’s sat through the preceding few decades of U.S. media . At the same time , its joyously laughable quality actually work in its favor , because every sentence it pop out gravel too obvious or clichéd , the story takes another cockeyed , phantasmagoric turn . And unlike a lot of other alike movies , Generation P is tight paced — none of its scenes , musical theme or subplots outlives your attending span . If anything , this film has a fairly glorious case of A.D.D.
I suppose in the death , Generation P is paralleling Tatarsky ’s pursuance for his own identity operator with his attack to produce Modern “ brand identities ” for the products he ’s sell . The intersection showcased in Generation P are always American , and they play the American dream of democracy and individualism . Tatarsky tries to craft message for these gay American ware that make common sense in Russia , but more and more all he can come up with is eldritch scenes of bloodshed and chaos . Advertising is n’t even about trade product , it ’s about fortify the self-importance — both the ego of the consumer , and the egotism of the producer . Meanwhile , Tatarsky ’s drug explorations show him that even the fakery of advertizing and CG politics are faux , with something even weirder and more sinister behind it .
Why would you want to see Generation P ? If you miss the absurdist pic of the 1970s and eighties and want to souse your head in a really strange seditious stumble . If you have a Terry Gilliam jones and ca n’t wait for Zero Theorem .
To some extent , all dystopias are about absurdity — they ’re about imagining government that are both oppressive and ludicrous . Because when you curb up a really nonsensical , totally curb regimen to scrutiny , you could begin to see the illogicalness in all our real - world governing mental home . Most of our latter - twenty-four hour period dystopia are bleak and contrived and sometimes nutty , but they stop short of out - and - out blathering absurdity . Which is one reason why a film like Generation P , as flawed as it is , still feels pretty satisfying in the end .
Generation P is opening in dramaturgy in San Francisco and Berkeley this weekend , and I know it ’s out in a few other city right now .
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