DAU

DAU

2026 · 195 min · Drama, Thriller

Inspired by the life of Soviet physicists who created the atomic bomb, DAU tells the story of a brilliant Greek-born physicist living in the USSR from 1928 to 1968. Driven to understand the laws of the universe, Dau is soon forced to use his genius in service of the state and help create the deadliest weapon in history. In a secret research institute, everyday life is shaped by scientific dominance, power, surveillance and privilege. Increasingly stripped of his autonomy, Dau attempts to find freedom and happiness outside his marriage through an endless succession of affairs, ultimately losing both himself and his ability to love. Spanning four transformative decades, DAU is both an intimate portrait of one man and a monumental fresco of a society shaped by violence and ideology. It is a saga about the search for happiness, the price of freedom, and the countless everyday compromises that quietly shape both a human destiny and the course of history.

Directed by Ilya Khrzhanovsky · Written by Ilya Khrzhanovsky

In theaters Sep 9, 2026

Cast

Make it a double feature

5h 27m together

DAU

DAU. The Empire. Novel One: Return Of The Prodigal Son

Both from Ilya Khrzhanovsky.

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DAU. The Empire. Novel One: Return Of The Prodigal Son

DAU. The Empire. Novel One: Return Of The Prodigal Son · 2020

DAU. The Empire. Novel One: Return Of The Prodigal Son

«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!

Bed Stories

Bed Stories · 2003

Seven interconnecting stories that take place in Russian bedrooms. These include a son visiting his complaining bedridden mother, a middle-aged couple bickering, one soldier bullying another in an army barracks, a rich childless housewife picking up the soldier for rough sex while her husband has a tryst with another man arranged by computer, and a wife who asks to be handcuffed to her bed while being videotaped by her lover.

Babi Yar. Context

Babi Yar. Context · 2021

Babi Yar. Context

MovieDocumentaryHistory

Nazi troops massacre 30,000 Jews over a three-day period in September 1941. Babyn Yar ravine in Kyiv, Ukraine.

DAU. Nora Son

DAU. Nora Son · 2020

Alienated from the rest of the scientific Institute in which they live, a lonely housewife and her teenage son break the ultimate taboo, with only their submissive maid to bear witness.

DAU. Natasha

DAU. Natasha · 2020

Natasha runs the canteen at a secret 1950s Soviet research institute. This is the beating heart of the DAU universe, everyone drops in here: the institute's employees, scientists and visiting foreign guests. Natasha's world is a small one, split between the demands of the canteen during the day and alcohol fuelled nights with her younger colleague Olga, during which the two confide their hopes of romance and for a different future. At a party one evening Natasha becomes close to a visiting French scientist Luc Bige and the two sleep together. The following day her life takes a dramatic turn when she is summoned to an interrogation by the KGB's General Vladimir Azhippo who questions the nature of her relationship with the foreign guest.

DAU. Degeneration

DAU. Degeneration · 2020

DAU. Degeneration

MovieDramaHorror

A secret Soviet Institute conducts scientific and occult experiments on animals and human beings to create the perfect person. The KGB general and his aides turn a blind eye to erotic adventures of the director of the Institute, scandalous debauches of prominent scientists and their cruel and insane research. One day, a radical ultra right-wing group arrives in the laboratory under the guise of test subjects. They get a task - to eradicate the decaying elements of the Institute’s community, and if needs be, destroy the fragile world of secret Soviet science.

Two men and a woman happen to meet in a bar. We learn from their conversations both the intriguing and banal details of their lives. But is anyone really telling the truth?

DAU. Nora Mother

DAU. Nora Mother · 2020

DAU. Nora Mother

Once just a girl from the provinces, Nora is now married to a successful scientist and lives together with her family within the confines of a secret and privileged Moscow institute. Nora is visited by her mother for the first time since her wedding. Her mother closely observes the atmosphere within the couple's home, trying to work out whether her daughter is happy. During the course of their intimate conversations the complexity of their contradictory relationship is revealed.

DAU. Brave People

DAU. Brave People · 2020

DAU. Brave People

It is 1953, Stalin has just died. It is a troubled and uncertain period for the whole of the Soviet Union, particularly for the state security services. In the Institute, a secret research facility, the scientists continue their theoretical and experimental work. Every night they strain their ears to listen for footsteps in the dark corridors: who have they come for this time? Who has reported on who? Having survived the fear and humiliation of an interrogation, the Head of the Theoretical Department, Andrei Losev, refuses to cooperate with the security services, only to face a new ordeal back in his own home.

DAU. Three Days

DAU. Three Days · 2020

DAU. Three Days

It is 1956. Dau is a distinguished Soviet scientist who meets up with the love of his youth – Maria, a Greek actress – during her three day visit to Moscow. They haven’t seen each other for 25 years. Dau is a successful and prosperous scientist, but feels excruciatingly dissatisfied with his family life. Through Maria he hopes to regain lost harmony and beauty, but reality intrudes when Nora, Dau’s wife, returns home.

DAU. Katya Tanya

DAU. Katya Tanya · 2020

DAU. Katya Tanya

Katya, a young librarian, believes in love, but her ideals are crushed by reality. After a string of disappointing affairs, Katya finally finds tenderness and understanding in the arms of her colleague, a journalist called Tanya. But then the First Department interferes: the state security services see this relationship as unacceptable for a Soviet woman.

DAU. Sasha Valera

DAU. Sasha Valera · 2020

DAU. Sasha Valera

Sasha, a young janitor, notices a certain softness and kindness in an older janitor. In a small, secluded room, away from their colleagues, the two men waver between resisting and giving in to their feelings and desires, walking a tightrope between violent tendencies and a need for tenderness.

DAU. Cinema

DAU. Cinema · 2020

MovieDramaHistory

An ongoing experiment, evolving from a biopic about Soviet physicist Lev Landau into a large scale project – part cinematic cycle, part behavioral experiment – involving hundreds of participants from around the world. Combining elements of film, theatre, science, psychology, architecture, visual arts and performance, it has created a complex and absorbing world that has to be lived as much as seen.

DAU. Nikita Tanya

DAU. Nikita Tanya · 2020

DAU. Nikita Tanya

Within the top secret Institute of Physics Problems, the scientist Nikita Nekrasov is visited by his wife and small children. While away from his family the physicist has managed to fall in love with other women. In open conversations with his spouse – in the bedroom, the dining room, and while out walking – he attempts to convince her of the legitimacy of polygamous relationships, and to test the limits of her unconditional love.

DAU. New Man

DAU. New Man · 2020

Maxim and his comrades-in-arms are participating in top-secret experiments into the creation of a new man. The employees of the secret Institute are characterised by everything Maxim detests: alcoholism, depravity, weak will, loss of ideals, and lack of faith in the future. Vika, one of the waitresses in the Institute's cafeteria, falls in love with the young communist, though she is scared by his fascination with eugenics and his violent tendencies. Vika hopes that her passion and tenderness will soften Maxim, while the state security agents keep a watchful eye on their developing relationship.

DAU. String Theory

DAU. String Theory · 2020

DAU. String Theory

Nikita Nekrasov is a scientist, a theoretical physicist who studies our world and other possible worlds. He refuses to make a choice between mathematics and physics, between one woman and another, as he ponders the existence of the multi-universe. At scientific conferences, attended by eminent foreign scientists and a rising younger generation of physicists alike, Nekrasov gets carried away debating the beauty of string theory. He attempts to explain to all of his women – Katya, the librarian, Zoya, the scientific secretary, Svetalana, the head of department – about the theory of his own polygamy, and the possibility of having enough feelings to satisfy everyone.

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