Russian Horror and Russian Noir: Egor Abramenko's Sputnik
St Petersburg University and its Representative Office in Barcelona invite you to the online lecture “Russian Horror and Russian Noir: Egor Abramenko’s Sputnik”. The lecture will be delivered by Liubov Bugaeva, Professor in the Department of the History of Russian Literature at St Petersburg University, author of Literatura i rite de passage (2010) and more than 200 articles on the theory and history of literature and cinematography.
Art has always been about complex human emotions, one of which is fear. In cinematography, the emotional scenario of fear combines the genres of horror, thriller, fantasy and psychological drama. It is noteworthy that in Russian films and TV series that employ different strategies of fear, a trend has emerged which can be labelled as “Russian noir”. The world on the screen is coloured with cold “halftones” and appears not only gloomy, but also disturbing. What is the difference between the Russian noir phenomenon and classic noir and neo-noir? What are the Scandinavian and Nordic noirs known for, and how to create a noir atmosphere of mystery and fear?
Egor Abramenko’s Sputnik (2020) is about an astronaut who returns to Earth from an orbital mission with an alien organism living inside him. Fear becomes an integral part of the sci-fi plot of this film, gradually turning into a psychological and social drama. The film reveals all five major strategies of fear, which we will talk about in detail during our next meeting.
The lecture will be held online in Russian with simultaneous interpreting into Spanish.