Anatoly Vasiliev

Inspired by the physicists who built the Soviet atomic bomb, the film DAU follows a brilliant Greek-born physicist from 1928 through four tumultuous decades in the USSR. Driven to uncover the laws of the universe, the idealistic Dau is drawn into state service to help create one of history’s deadliest weapons. Inside a secret research institute, life is governed by scientific ambition, power, surveillance and privilege. As his autonomy erodes, Dau seeks freedom beyond his marriage through a succession of affairs, gradually losing both himself and his capacity to love. At once an intimate portrait of a man in pursuit of happiness and freedom and a vast fresco of a society founded on violence and ideology, DAU traces the small compromises that shape a life and alter the course of history.

A mathematician in a secret Soviet research Institute believes that ayahuasca is the key to unlocking all the potential of the quantum universe, but its nightmarish visions also foreshadow his tragic demise.

An exploration of 20th century Russia, following the fusing of the Party and the state after the Russian Civil War, which opened the doors to corruption, resulting in the exiling of the left and right opposition. Described using a combination of historical settings, biographies and masterpieces from Russian avant-garde artists, composers and writers from this period in history.

Celebrated Russian theatre director Anatoly Vasiliev's Asino (Italian for donkey) is an epic ode to this beast of burden. The donkey has a long cultural history dating back to Greek mythology and the Bible: Jesus rode into Jerusalem on one; Sancho Panza had a loyal donkey; Winnie the Pooh was friends with the dejected Eeyore. Donkeys stand for stupidity, stubbornness and humility.

«The Return of the Prodigal Son» is the first volume from the film (novel) of Anatoli Vassiliev’s «Empire» inside the Dau cycle. The story is about inner kinship, which is much closer than blood, about inevitable betrayal, about almost fatherly love and forgiveness. Cigarettes (papirossa), images from «Faust» and «Don Juan», walks in the Soviet Park of culture... And a terrible, narrow gap inside the brutal regime where you have to be skilled enough to survive... Yes! and they also play gorodki (skittles) with childish passion!

The action takes place in Moscow, in the 70s. The characters have not seen each other for many years, but now they have met and are reminiscing about their youth, when they were students at the institute, jazz enthusiasts, and known as stylists.

Based on Turgenev's novel

The film "Who left the Light ..." is dedicated to the memory of theater director, theater and film actor Vladimir Ageev. He has been called "the main alchemist of modern filmmaking." A student of Anatoly Vasiliev, Vladimir Ageev paved his own path in art. His search and research led him to create his own creative style, to the "Theater of Mystery and Joy". The film uses archival recordings of the director's rehearsals, fragments from performances.