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Directed by Angelina Nikonova | 105 minutes | 18+ | Victorian Premiere |
10:15pm Friday, 15 May | Balam Balam Place - Cinema 2 | Buy Tickets | Buy Passes
A criminally underseen, staggering spin on the rape-revenge genre and a haunting vision of modern Russia from pioneering director Angelina Nikonova.
Marina, an upper-crust social worker with a doting husband and an enviable downtown apartment, is suddenly transformed into a bizarre twilight version of herself when she is raped by three policemen.
Angelina Nikonova's provocative, indelible psychodrama Twilight Portrait screened to critical acclaim at film festivals around the world in 2011 and then disappeared for the next 15 years, available only on torrent sites for those determined enough to track it down. Written by Nikonova and the film's lead actress Olga Dykhovichnaya, the film upends the cliches of the male-driven rape-revenge genre by presenting the audience with a woman whose response to sexual violence is complex, confounding and completely unforgettable.
Screens with a prerecorded interview with Angelina Nikonova
SIMILAR: The Night Porter,Elle, Montenegro, the films of Michael Haneke
"Masterpiece. Perhaps the most cruelly ignored film I have ever seen [...] a serious rabbit-hole movie that pulls no punches." - Kevin Royal Johnson, Author of The Dark Page: Books That Inspired American Film Noir 1940–1949 and The Dark Page II: Books That Inspired American Film Noir 1950–1965
"[...] the delicate and all consuming mystique of this powerful film can’t be reduced in any way that’s neat and easily digestible." - Peter Galvin, SBS
CONTENT WARNING: Sexual Violence
Country: Russian Federation
Year: 2011
Language: Russian