“Orthodox ISIL” Steers Toward the Cinema
For the first time, Christian zealots have resorted to acts of terror
Published: Sepember 6, 2017, Andrei Mel’nikov, Nezavisimaya Gazeta.
When, at the beginning of this year, the mysterious organization Christian State of Holy Rus’* threatened to blow up a cinema where the film Matilda was going to be shown, many considered these warnings to be the empty chest-thumping of the marginalized. Meanwhile, the threats have continued to come, even recently. The last of them dates from August. And then it flared up for real.
Early in the morning of September 4, a man behind the wheel of a UAZ vehicle rammed into the entrance of the Cosmos cinema in Yekaterinburg. The vehicle was full of gas cylinders, and the driver, exiting the cab, threw a bottle of flammable liquid into the foyer of the movie theater. He expected the fire to engulf the vehicle and an explosion of the gas cylinder to occur. However, the fire was extinguished fairly quickly, and the attacker’s intentions did not come to fruition.
The criminal was interrogated. He said that his name is Denis Murashov, he had arrived in Yekaterinburg the night before; he had spent the entire previous day at the Church of All Saints, which is dedicated to the memory of Nicholas II, and then he “went to the movies”. The goal was the movie theater; Yekaterinburg is the city where the most striking events unfolded throughout the year-long campaign against Matilda — all of this suggests that the attack was inspired by the hysteria that blazed among opponents of the film which, in their opinion, offends the memory of the Tsar who is glorified by the Russian Orthodox Church as a martyr and saint.
Citing the attacker’s acquaintances, znak.com reported that he was against Alexei Uchitel’s film. The media investigated Murashov’s social media accounts and discovered evidence of his interest in the problems of political orthodoxy. The content analysis suggested that the man is inclined towards the marginal currents of national orthodoxy, which practice a cult of controversial saints and profess extreme intolerance towards dissent.
A week earlier, they threw bottles of flammable liquid at the St. Petersburg studio of the director of the film, a film which was controversial even before its release. The fire in the studio didn’t end up inflicting as much material damage as shifting the discussion of the film about the love affair of a Russian emperor and a ballerina from the field of verbal provocation into the sphere of illegal violence.
Many people regard the incidents in Yekaterinburg as the result of a campaign that Deputy of the State Duma and a former Prosecutor General of the Republic of Crimea Natalya Poklonskaya is waging against Uchitel’s films. This course has been marked by a number of stages, each of which opened an increasingly absurd page in the history of the development of Russian political culture. There were also appeals to the prosecutor, and prayer vigils of Orthodox activists; it got to the point when Poklonskaya, with photographs in her hands, was discussing the artistic career of the porno actor who played the role of Nicholas II. The nature of the controversy, spiraling downward into vaudeville-operatic notes, suddenly degenerated into acts of political terror.
A number of notable figures support Poklonskaya in this fight, including the priest and former functionary in the Moscow Patriarchy Archpriest Vsevolod Chaplin. He dedicated a large number of speeches and remarks to the battle with Matilda. On September 4 in particular, after the incident with Cosmos movie theater, Chaplin made a post on social media in which he supports Polkonsky’s findings in the area of pornography. “Mr. Eidinger (the actor who plays the role of the Tsar — “NGR”) definitely plays with satanic symbols on his [social media] account, and tries to belittle christian symbols…” writes the priest, “Don’t tell me, then, that the choice of this actor for the role of Tsar Nicholas was coincidental. In fact, I am convinced that Matilda is an cult-mystical, satanic manipulation of Russia. Symbolic regicide. Even if not all of the filmmakers are completely aware of it”.
However, official church representation was quick to condemn Murashov’s act. On the evening of September 4 the Yekaterinburg diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church released a special statement which was published on the diocese website. “We regard the attack with attempted arson at KKC Cosmos as an unprecedented, publicly dangerous act that deserves unconditional condemnation and punishment of the perpetrator, whatever their motives may have been”, it says in the report. However, in the text, the condemnation of the crime was given much less space than was given to complaints that the believers’ opinions are being ignored and there is insufficient dialogue regarding Matilda. “We express our concerns that on the 100 year anniversary of the tragic death of the Tsar’s family, showing of works of art that divide the citizens of Russia can not be a means of building peace and mutual respect”, states the diocese. Thus, in a way, the diocese shifts responsibility for the incident onto those who defend the director’s right to free creativity.
Alexei Uchitel has accused Natalya Poklonskaya of supporting terrorists. “Before our eyes, we are seeing a new terrorist organization forming under the guise of religion, having no relation either to Russian traditions, nor to genuine Russian Orthodoxy. They are only interested in the destabilization of society, in violence and war. We know know the names of those who are behind them”, quotes the director’s press release. In his words, Poklonskaya is behind them, she “does not hide that she supports these organizations and guarantees them protection”. It is not specified which precise organizations are being discussed.
Meanwhile, the Orthodox activists from the movement Forty Times Forty, who participated in the all-Russian “prayer vigil against Matilda” on August 1 offered their protection to the director after the first attack on Uchitel’s studio. “The incident with Mr. Uchitel’s studio is a provocation designed to discredit believers who are legitimately protesting against his film Matilda. For us, the commandment “thou shalt not kill” is immutable”, announced the leader of the movement Andrei Kormukhin. He suggested that an attack on the director was being prepared. Uchitel refuted Forty Times Forty’s protection. “Why did they plan to guard me and from whom, from themselves?” RIA Novosti quoted Matilda’s author. Meanwhile, Orthodox activists have appointed the next “vigil” against the film for September 17. It is worth noting that almost no one has seen the film yet; the premiere will only take place in October.
This battle against a film seen by no one; and these feelings, which are outraged by the mirage of an alleged blasphemy, give the situation a kind of absurd and also sinister character. A sense is developing that the issue isn’t about a specific film, but about a symptomatic psychological (so far!) execution of the so-called creative class (one could use the good old word “intelligentsia”). The case of the theater director Kirill Serebrennikov fits into this context as well. Although church-affiliated forces were not formally involved in discussions about the avant-garde director, during discussions few people invoked the nature of the corruption allegations against Serebrennikov; the conversation was in the context of the opposition of conservative aesthetics of official art to the Gogol Center. Opponents note the “immorality” and “cosmopolitanism” of the director, and proponents note the liberal rebelliousness and rejection of “spiritual bonds”.
Thus, the menacing attention of the most obscurantist forces in religious society has turned to the representatives of modern culture and — increasingly — to the intelligentsia. The intelligentsia, in turn, is disarmed by its reverence to the religious agenda, considering obscurantist displays to be the machinations of the political “regime”, and not a natural essence of religious practice. The permissiveness of the adherents’ “bonds” on one hand, and the starry-eyed illusions of the liberal opposition on the other, turn political ecclesiasticism into an ideal weapon against the creative class.
This process allows you to make what was recently considered a phantasmagoria into a true story: “Orthodox Taliban”, or the “Orthodox ISIL” (Taliban and ISIL are terrorist organizations banned in the Russian Federation- annotation NGR). Perhaps we need to remember September 4, 2017, the day when patriotic Christian zealots resorted to methods of serious, entirely un-operatic terror.
*Translator’s note: This is an intentional play on title Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, or ISIL.
Translation by Linden Marno-Ferree